Barbarian was one of the best genre films in 2022. Narrowly avoiding a streaming-only fate, it went on to become a cult and critical favourite, with a nutty IYKYK storyline and a gangbusters lead performance from Georgina Campbell. Even now, the film is best enjoyed when you remain unaware of the central concept and overall direction. In short, it was a refreshing and original slant on several horror tropes… and was bloody good. It was surprisingly the writing/directing feature-length debut for US comedian and actor Zach Cregger. The trouble is, and M. Night Shyamalan knows this painfully well (amongst others), when you score a cinematic goal, people expect you to be the filmmaking equivalent of Pele and nail it with every follow-up. So, hopes were perhaps unfairly high for his next project… and here it is. Cregger wrote the screenplay for Weapons and put it on the market in January 2023, where Netflix came within a whisker of grabbing it. However, New Line Cinema secured it, and after some cast shuffling (this was very nearly yet ANOTHER Pedro Pascal starrer), it was shot in Atlanta in May 2024. It stars the always watchable headliners Josh Brolin and Julia Garner (who provided the best moments of the lacklustre Apartment 7a and was wasted in Wolf Man but is served better here). Locked and loaded, it’s now screening in the US and UK and getting some surprisingly positive critical plaudits.

 

The film opens by setting up the basic concept. A child narrator tells us that 17 children are missing, having absconded from their homes in the small Pennsylvanian town of Maybrook at 02:17 in the morning, all apparently of their own free will. Creepy opening footage shows them running Naruto-style into the night, in a moment that is beautifully edited to George Harrison’s “Beware of Darkness” (big plus point right there!). What makes the incident even weirder is that they all came from the same class belonging to teacher Justine Gandy (Garner), leaving just one of her pupils (Cary Christopher as Alex) turning up for registration the next morning. The story properly starts one month later, with the kids still missing and the town becoming increasingly more hostile towards poor Ms Gandy. One father (Josh Brolin as Archer Graff) in particular is still broken by the loss of his son and obsesses over the strange details. But that’s only until things start getting REALLY weird, as the fractured back stories of this American small town start to (almost literally) bleed into each other.

 

The colder you go into this, the better this will be. Having said that, if you thought Barbarian was “out there”… you ain’t seen nothing yet! Let’s hope Cregger doesn’t get pigeonholed into “that bloke who makes one-word titled horror films with WTAF plots”, because, at the very least, this thoroughly entertaining smorgasbord of a movie is a fun ride that promises much for the future. The first thing to acknowledge is the story structure. Far from being a straightforward freaky fairy tale told in one flowing narrative, Weapons is basically The Twilight Zone meets Pulp Fiction… or if you want to acknowledge Cregger’s inspiration, Paul Thomas Anderson’s Magnolia can be swapped in. Because, after the setup, we get 5 separate chapters, each from a different character’s perspective, and of course, only one of them knows the full story. It’s a neat twist on the usual horror-mystery and gives it a “Rashomon” type feel where incidents are seen from 5 different POVs and the explanations are gradually drip-fed to the audience, as they learn answers at roughly the same rate as some of the players. For a non-spoiler example, one character meets Justine in a bar during her story arc at the beginning with a hand injury. It’s only later in the film, during the progression of their own chapter, that you find out what caused this. Not unique, but it gives a classy and intriguing angle to the proceedings.

 

The first part of the film is undoubtedly the most playful and deep section, as well as being the creepiest, with some great jump scares and odd sequences. In this respect, it very much pays a debt to Stephen King’s vision of America and well-publicised paranoia. The dream vision of a giant automatic rifle floating over a house can’t be written off as just somnambulistic imagery, nor can the meaning of the title itself. In several instances and meanings, people are “weaponised” to an extent, and the parents' small-minded conviction that a teacher has been radicalising their children in order to snatch them away is certainly a very real fear that exists now, hence the unwarranted treatment of one individual in the plot. That’s not a spoiler, by the way. In that respect, there exists a sly satirical element that underlines most situations. There is, in fact, a very strong current of dark humour that runs throughout the storyline that may be unexpected to many. This culminates in a grand guignol climax that is somehow just as hilarious as it is disturbing. Trust me. That makes sense once you’ve seen it, and it’s destined to become one of the most talked about endings in a film since 28 Years Later … but in a better way this time.

 

On viewing the trailers and seeing clips, you may wonder why the word “hilarious” was used just then. But the film is definitely goofier and funnier than you would expect from the subject matter. Not to mention that the initial creepiness-over-gore tone swaps places at half-time to include graphic body squashing, head-crushing, and skin-peeling. The tonal changes don’t always land, and it has to be said that a lot of people are going to be blindsided (perhaps not so positively) by the later developments, which stray well into several genre boundaries. Clues are given for those looking for them at the start (Keep an eye on the blackboard), but it’s going to be “a lot” for those looking forward to a rational get-out or Scooby Doo unmasking at the end. That is definitely going to be a strong influence on how much you enjoy the film as a whole.

 

To be subjective, the film is admittedly a little too long, and there are a couple of subplots (arguably whole chapters) that don’t progress the central story to a great degree. Yes, they never become too frustrating and it does add a lot of depth to the proceedings, but spending time on a tweaker’s back story doesn’t feel like good use of the 2 hours-plus running time when we could have learned more about Archer’s detecting or spent more time with some of the other parents of the missing kids.  Cregger squeezes in cameos from Sara Paxton and Justin Long (both also in Barbarian), as two of those very parents. But to be honest, it would have been better to spend more exploring Justine’s treatment at the hands of the town or Archer berating the cops than seeing one character selling cutlery in a pawn shop. It helps that Garner and Brolin are so good in their roles as well. A couple of shots of seeing Archer sleeping in his son’s bed and Justine glugging vodka from a big-gulp cup add as much depth as anything else. Lovely little incidental details flesh out unexplored plot areas, such as the fact that Justine knows the bartender’s first name due to frequenting the bar so often and Archer’s wife’s icy “I’m going to work now”, which speaks volumes.

 

One other point worth adding here is the dynamic cinematography. Cregger has a real eye for movement and framing. Apart from the evocative sequences of the kids running, check out the scene where the camera shoots directly in front of Garner as she swiftly zig-zags supermarket lanes, whilst an unknown assailant gradually catches up to her from behind. Also, note any of the chase sequences or the placing of elements for jump scares, which are masterfully executed. All of this bodes well, at least in theory, for Cregger’s next project, which is (yet another) cinematic adaptation of the Resident Evil games. Incidentally, the actor/actors who play the villain/villains (no clues here!) do an exemplary job and should be acknowledged for his/her/their/its skills in creating the big bad. Most subversive for something like this, and it works a treat.

 

But truth be told, it all doesn’t quite flow or hang together as well as Barbarian did. And on reflection, despite the plot structure and the performances (not to mention the gore), it feels like a B-movie plot with an A-list cast and a large budget thrown at it. Not that this is a bad thing, but some of the audience is bound to be nonplussed by the denouement and the aesthetics towards the end. Despite the minor gripes covered here, this is still an excellent genre experience and a pleasure to watch with a crowd (and our cinema screening was crowded… which was great to see). Most important of all is the fact that it’s not another reboot or sequel or remake. It’s an original horror that plays with cinematic methods and should be appreciated for that if nothing else. And the ending will leave an impression on everybody, that’s for sure. Good stuff. Shoot to the cinema and see it.