Edgar Wright adapted Stephen King’s The Running Man, the most recent life-or-death competition movie that puts its lead characters up against impossible odds. Of course, The Running Man was previously made in the 1980s, and it wasn’t even the earliest of these competition movies, as they go back to the start of cinema.
However, thanks to the rise of young adult dystopian fiction and the films made from those novels, life-or-death competition movies have enjoyed tremendous success at the box office in the 21st century. Many of these films were also huge success stories, although some of these movies are better than others.
The Running Man (2025)
The original Running Man came out in 1987 with Arnold Schwarzenegger in the lead, but that movie had very little to do with Stephen King’s story. However, Edgar Wright (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz) released his version, which is much more loyal to King’s story, in 2025 with Glen Powell in the lead role.
The Running Man follows Ben Richards, a man who chooses to take part in the Running Man television competition. This televised game show sees a person running for their lives while trained assassins hunt them down. They have to survive a specified time to win the grand prize; otherwise, they die.
The King novel was published in 1982 under the Richard Bachman pseudonym, and predated the reality TV craze by well over a decade. While Wright changed The Running Man’s ending from the original story, it remains a faithful look at a man who will do anything to survive a rigged competition and bring the company behind it down.
The Game (1997)
The Game is a David Fincher movie that sets up the game, but then doesn’t let the viewers know what is real and what isn’t until the very end. Michael Douglas stars as a businessperson who has become so obsessed with his job that he neglects his family and personal life, and his brother has a plan to solve that.
His brother buys him a spot in a game where he learns he is rejected. However, when he returns to his home, he finds strange things happening to him, and suddenly, he is on the run for his life as people are trying to kill him. When they deplete his bank accounts and get him fired, he suddenly doesn’t know what is really happening to him.
The Game is a movie that is great on first viewing, and then a rewatch offers plenty of clues. However, this is also a movie where the twist at the end is the most significant revelation, and it is best to go into the film knowing as little as possible.
Gamer (2009)
Gamer is a 2009 Gerard Butler movie that tries to show a world where humans can control other humans via a video game. Logan Lerman co-stars as the teenage gamer who controls him, while Butler himself is on death row and agrees to volunteer in the third-person shooter, where, if he survives 30 matches, he earns his freedom.
When Butler’s prisoner escapes the system, he sets out to bring it all down while trying to survive an assassin hired by the game designer, who is not controlled by a human player. The film is a look at video game culture and the control that the wealthy have over society, although shot with the kinetic nature of directors Mark Neveldine and Brian Tayler.
Critics were not impressed, awarding the film a 30% Rotten Tomatoes rating. While a mix of Rollerball and The Matrix, the action beats make it a live-or-death competition movie worth checking out.
Death Race 2000 (1975)
Released in 1975, Death Race 2000 is a Roger Corman-produced movie that remains a cult classic to this day. This movie is about a transcontinental race where the racers are both trying to get across the country first, but they also gain points for running down and killing pedestrians along the way.
If anything, Death Race 2000 borrows a lot from professional wrestling, with the main character a racer known as Frankenstein, played by David Carradine. He is the leading champion and a merciless killer who is also a nationwide celebrity thanks to his success playing the game.
The movie was based on the success of Rollerball, but in this film, it was all about the carnage and killing involved, and it was popular enough to spawn a remake in 2008. Its strong satire, as well as an early role for Sylvester Stallone, make this a cult classic worth its reputation.
Mortal Kombat (1995)
Based on the video game of the same name, Mortal Kombat was a Paul W.S. Anderson movie about a group of human fighters who gathered together every generation to battle representatives from other realms in the Outworld. If the Outworld wins 10 straight victories, Earth is forfeit to invasion.
Of all the movies about life-or-death competitions, this one takes it the most seriously. Each warrior goes into battle, and the one who survives moves on to the next round. It is also unique since the video game ensures that most of the competitors are fan favorites, from Johnny Cage and Rayden to Scorpion and Sub-Zero.
The franchise moved on, with a 1997 sequel and then a prequel and a reboot in 2021, but nothing really matches up to the first Mortal Kombat movie when it comes to getting the games right.
Alita: Battle Angel (2019)
Alita: Battle Angel is an interesting movie because it is not really a movie about killing all the competition to win. Instead, this is more like Rollerball, but in the future, and with the competitors having robotic upgrades and powers. However, the game has no problems with trying to kill the opposition, and that is what the villains try to do to Alita.
Directed by Robert Rodriguez, the action of the game is fast and exciting, and the danger is always on display. While Rosa Salazar is slightly disturbing with the CGI enlarging her eyes and giving a sense of the uncanny valley, the movie remains great fun and is highly underrated.
The movie was a box office success, although its higher budget made it only break even in the end. Despite this, there have still been calls for a sequel, although it would need both Robert Rodriguez and James Cameron to return to make it happen.
Ready Or Not (2019)
Ready or Not is a unique movie about a life-or-death game because the person involved had no idea she was competing until it was almost too late. Samara Weaving stars as a woman who is planning to marry a wealthy man and goes to his family’s mansion to meet his family. Once there, everything goes wrong.
When the family tells her they plan to play a game, and it turns out to be hide-and-seek, she realizes the real game is that her fiancé’s family is planning to murder her when they find her. She has to fight for her life before she discovers the truth behind the deadly game and what her fiancé’s family really is.
With 89% Rotten Tomatoes rating, Ready or Not was a surprise hit in 2019, a horror movie with a dark, humorous streak throughout.
The Long Walk (2025)
The Running Man wasn’t the only Stephen King movie to hit theaters in 2025 based on his Richard Bachman novels. Coming out earlier in the year, The Long Walk was another Bachman novel, this one about a much more devastating and brutal life-or-death competition.
In this movie, a group of young teenage boys are chosen, one from each state, and forced to start walking with the military following closely behind. When anyone drops below a certain speed for enough time, they are murdered by the military. The last one standing wins.
This was a King story that several filmmakers have wanted to make for years. Finally, Francis Lawrence (The Hunger Games) got to make it, and what resulted was a movie with an 88% Rotten Tomatoes score and a decent box office take. In all, it is a brutal but fascinating look at survival.
The Hunger Games (2012)
One of the most famous life-or-death competition movies is The Hunger Games. Based on the novel series by Suzanne Collins, this takes place in a dystopian future where the wealthy Capitol rules over 13 different districts left in poverty. Every year, two children are chosen at random from each district to fight to the death.
The first Hunger Games movie is the one that really goes into the most detail about the games. This shows the young kids fighting to kill each other so that they can survive and make it out of the Games and return home. However, there is more to the story than just kids killing kids.
This is a story about standing up against authoritarianism and the rights of the people. While the first movie was sold on the life-or-death games, the rest of the series was about revolution and ensuring future generations didn’t have to live through this horrendous treatment.
Battle Royale (2000)
While a lot of people seem to think that The Hunger Games created the dystopian life-or-death games genre, that is far from the truth. Twelve years before The Hunger Games was released as a movie, and years before the novels were written, Battle Royale did it first, and in some cases, did it better.
This Japanese movie by Kinji Fukasaku follows a group of junior high school students who are forced to fight to the death by a totalitarian Japanese government. The film was so controversial when it was released that it didn’t get a United States release until 2010, when Anchor Bay Films acquired it.
Quentin Tarantino has called this life-or-death competition movie one of his favorite films. The film helped introduce the world to several young Asian actors and helped revolutionize the battle royale film genre.
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