‘Weapons’ review: Julia Garner and Josh Brolin lead ‘Barbarian’ filmmaker’s inventive new horror

Dir/scr: Zach Cregger. US. 2025. 129mins

Author-director Zach Cregger’s second solo characteristic performs on any mother or father’s worry — the mysterious disappearance of a kid — to craft an intricately plotted, supremely twisty horror-thriller. Just like the filmmaker’s 2022 characteristic Barbarian, Weapons takes its time laying out its elaborate story, repeatedly shifting views and principal characters till all of the myriad strands come collectively in immensely satisfying trend.

Considerably ratchets up the strain, resulting in a gripping last chapter

Opening Weapons on August 8 within the UK and US, Warner Bros. has left the image shrouded in secrecy, a sensible transfer to maintain audiences from understanding an excessive amount of about what is going to unfold. Josh Brolin and Julia Garner present business firepower, however horror followers could also be most due to Cregger, whose low-budget Barbarian grossed a formidable $45 million worldwide. With out direct competitors within the market, Weapons won’t be killer on the field workplace, however theatrical returns ought to be stable.

In a small Pennsylvania city, a weird prevalence has taken place: at precisely 2:17am, 17 college students from the identical third-grade class all walked out of their houses and ran off into the evening, by no means to be seen once more. Looking for solutions, the shocked dad and mom — led by indignant, grieving father Archer (Brolin) — begin to scapegoat Justine (Garner), who was the category’ trainer. Overwhelmed by the misdirected rage hurled her manner, Justine swears she had nothing to do with the youngsters’s disappearance, insisting she is simply as confused and upset as everybody else. 

Decided to resolve what occurred — partly, to clear her title — Justine tries to get in touch with Alex (Cary Christopher), her solely pupil who, inexplicably, didn’t disappear. However involved principal Marcus (Benedict Wong) refuses to permit her to get in contact with the traumatised Alex and forces Justine to take a go away of absence from the college. 

Barbarian boasted a intelligent construction by which Cregger included three distinct story segments, solely step by step revealing the terrifying origins of a seemingly abnormal rental house. His strategy is much more bold for his follow-up, which tells its story over six chapters, every dedicated to a separate character. Weapons could initially deal with Justine, however the script shortly establishes its narrative cadence, ending every section with an unnerving cliffhanger earlier than shifting on to a brand new, momentary protagonist.

Discussing Weapons’ further aspect characters dangers spoiling the surprises in retailer. However let it’s stated that Cregger adroitly introduces a set of supplemental figures — together with Alden Ehrenreich’s incompetent cop Paul — who intrigue each as people and as spokes within the narrative wheel. It’s a testomony to the movie’s total self-assurance that, early on, Cregger eschews main scares, assured that creating an aura of dread shall be ample to hook horror followers. That stated, the writer-director and cinematographer Larkin Seiple do design some haunting pictures, particularly throughout a slow-motion sequence of the youngsters working from their houses as if in a trance, with George Harrison’s ‘Beware Of Darkness’ including chilling musical accompaniment. However in due time, Weapons considerably ratchets up the strain, resulting in a gripping last chapter that delivers sustained terrors.

With such a puzzle-box plot, every chapter offering clues to what occurred to the lacking kids, the hazard is that the thriller will show extra scintillating than the payoff. However Cregger does terrific work answering the riddles he has teased all through the runtime. A rattling rating, courtesy of Cregger and his co-composers Ryan Holladay and Hays Holladay, hints at an unseen horror lurking on this tranquil Pennsylvania group, however these grander anxieties are juxtaposed with extra commonplace considerations, comparable to Justine’s rising alcoholism and Paul’s emotions of worthlessness. Weapons gracefully balances its totally different tensions, all of them cathartically launched in the course of the fantastically orchestrated, graphically violent last 20 minutes. 

Despite the fact that many characters criss-cross into one another’s lives in surprising methods, the writer-director grounds the proceedings in a realism that ensures no plot level is simply too convoluted. The performances are equally lifelike, with Brolin and Garner notably good portraying on a regular basis individuals pulled deeper right into a fiendish scheme they solely totally perceive (together with the viewers) within the movie’s final moments.

And regardless of Weapons’ ample horrors, the image can be darkly comedian, discovering the grim humour within the story’s fantastical, often playfully absurd extremes. Certainly, among the funniest scenes intertwine with essentially the most nerve-wracking because the characters come to grips with Cregger’s unimaginable, creative shocks. Just like the residents of this small city, viewers aren’t ready for what’s heading their manner.