STACK #254 December 2025

MOVIE FEATURE

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GENRE: Horror RUN TIME: 2h 15m

A HAUNTING GOODBYE THE CONJURING: LAST RITES More than 12 years since the first Conjuring film haunted cinemas, Aussie filmmaker James Wan bids a bittersweet farewell to his hit supernatural franchise with its final chapter, The Conjuring: Last Rites .

Patrick Wilson, Ben Hardy and Vera Farmiga

“I have definitely grown a lot since the first Conjuring film - it has been over a decade ago, and a lot has changed for me. But I will always look back at that first film with probably the fondest memories I will ever have in terms of my filmmaking career,” reflects Wan, 48, who – in partnering with fellow Aussie filmmaker and friend Leigh Whannell - changed the face of the horror industry with their Saw and Insidious franchises. But, in casting powerhouse actors Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga as real-life paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren in his 2013 Conjuring debut, Wan was able to bring real credibility to a typically B-list genre. While Wilson and Farmiga reprised

their roles across four movies – The Conjuring: Last Rites marking their last outing - then the franchise also spun off into three Annabelle movies and two The Nun films. “ The Conjuring was definitely the movie that really set me on the trajectory that I’d always wanted to be on. I’m so proud of this franchise and of the cinematic world we created,” says Wan, who would later branch out of horror, directing Furious 7 and two Aquaman films. In The Conjuring: Last Rites , we revisit Ed and Lorraine Warren as they

are pulled back into the

supernatural fray, despite their attempts to step away from

DYK?

exorcisms and high-stakes paranormal work. Farmiga has never taken her role lightly. “I

The movies Wolves at the Door and The Curse of the Weeping Woman are also connected to the Conjuring universe with character crossovers.

think that the Warrens are captivating because they are an epic couple. They trigger our belief in heroism and self-sacrifice. They show us

that if you embrace compassion and if you put your special gifts to use, then you can make the world a kinder, gentler, more loving, holier place,” says the actress. Gill Pringle

• The Conjuring: Last Rites is out Dec 3

The Conjuring, Annabelle, The Conjuring 2, Annabelle: Creation, The Nun, Annabelle Comes Home, The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It, The Nun II

HAVE YOU VENTURED INTO THE CONJURING UNIVERSE YET?

Inset: Director Francis Lawrence with Cooper Hoffman and David Jonsson

GENRE: Horror RUN TIME: 1h 48m

KING-SIZED STAKES: THE LONG WALK Director Francis Lawrence leaves the Hunger Games behind to take on another brutal dystopia with Stephen King’s The Long Walk .

I n truth, Stephen King’s first novel – published in 1979 under the pseudonym Richard Bachman - had preyed on his mind for the past two decades, long before The Hunger Games exploded on the big screen. “When I first read The Long Walk , there was something about its simplicity – a group of young men walking - that struck me as both horrifying and deeply human,” says the director whose film hit the screens just months before Edgar Wright’s remake of The Running Man , based on another King companion novel. In post-war America, a brutal annual contest, The Long Walk, grips the nation. Fifty boys are chosen by lottery to walk nonstop in a televised marathon – fall below three miles per hour three times, and you’re out.

Only one survives – and the winner earns unimaginable riches and a single wish. “Over the years, I kept coming back to it in my mind,” recalls Lawrence. “More than the thrilling walk-or-die concept, what really stuck with me is the camaraderie that develops among the walkers. Even though they’re technically competitors, they can’t help but bond, forming friendships that feel raw and authentic. “The relationship between Ray Garraty and Peter McVries, in particular, is what gives the story its emotional centre,” he says of the two young walkers, casting Brit actor David Jonsson as Peter and Cooper Hoffman as Ray. The son of the late Philip Seymour Hoffman, Lawrence felt especially connected to the up-and-coming Licorice Pizza star.

“I worked with his father on the Hunger Games films,” he reminisces. “And when he read for Ray, I felt instantly he was Garraty.” Hoffman, 22, views the “Long Walk” as a metaphor for life itself. “I saw the walk as a heightened

simulation of what we all go through,” says the actor. “At birth, you start your own long walk, and as you keep going, you make good friends and try your best to keep those you love near as firmly as possible. You try to never let them go. But eventually the long walk ends for everyone. It’s the human condition.” Gill Pringle

• The Long Walk is out Dec 17

IF YOU LIKE THIS, YOU’LL LOVE THESE:

The Running Man, The Hunger Games, The Maze Runner, Divergent

30 DECEMBER 2025

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