Just months before Lionsgate releases “The Long Walk,” its adaptation of Stephen King’s early-career dystopian novel, the studio has officially optioned the rights to another King title, “The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon,” with rising filmmaker JT Mollner set to write and direct.
The 1999 novel — a more intimate, psychological survival tale — centers on a nine-year-old girl named Trisha who gets lost in the woods. Alone and disoriented, her only connection to the outside world is a Walkman broadcasting Red Sox games. As her solitude deepens, she begins to hallucinate that her baseball hero, relief pitcher Tom Gordon, is guiding her to safety.
Mollner, who penned “The Long Walk” script (directed by Francis Lawrence), has been on the rise following the breakout success of “Strange Darling,” a 2024 psychological thriller that scored 96% on Rotten Tomatoes, and won several genre awards.