Weapons Review: An Engaging and Thrilling Horror Epic
Weapons is one of the most subversive films of the year and it's a great time.
One of the most fascinating aspects of horror in my opinion is the moments before the event takes place and the ramifications of the said horror. Scary and terrifying things happen within our culture all of the time, but we never delve into the ramifications, the aftermath of scary events. People are forever changed. If a serial killer went on a killing spree- he’s going to impact a lot more lives than just the people he killed. Those peoples have families, these people lived in a community that is now shattered forever. David Lynch’s groundbreaking show Twin Peaks is the perfect example of a show that starts with the tragedy, the death of Laura Palmer and then the horror is seeing the innocence and facade of a town slowly decade.
In Weapons, we get an opening narration that sets the stage for us. This is done with a little girl being very soft spoken. This choice feels like Zach Creggor telling his audience to shut up, it’s time for us to listen and discover this movie and it’s twists and turns. We learn that seventeen children, all from the same classroom one day all walked out of their houses and into the night. Narratively, Weapons is similar to Paul Thomas Anderson’s Magnolia as we see the viewpoints and perspectives of several people who are effected by this event. Some more directly than others. The first viewpoint we see is from the third grade teacher who’s class disappeared into the night and we see her struggle as the town declare her a witch.
I won’t spoil every point of views, but some of them are just adjacent to the incident at hand, showing how an event like this can have a ripple effect. I found this to be one of the most compelling parts of this movie. Zach Creggor likes to linger on characters, showing us their every day lives and having us connect with them on a deeper level until he pulls out the rug from under us as we discover new revelations in this mystery.
Zach Creggor is excellent on creating simple haunting imagery and creating so much tension within one scene. In jazz music, sometimes it’s about the notes you don’t play as much as the ones you do play- and this is what makes Weapons feel like jazz. It does feel like Creggor is only going to give you what he needs in a certain moment, to keep the audience engaged and guessing until the very final moment. The mystery box element of this movie is what keeps it fresh. Filmmaker J.J. Abrams have several times addressed the idea of creating a mystery box, always keeping your audience at your feet until it’s the perfect time to reveal. Don’t spoon feed them anything- keep them on edge.
The only issue with the mystery box approach is you need to deliver on an ending that will wow the audience. Does Weapons do that? I believe so. With how much the marketing and word of mouth has praised this movie for how crazy it gets, I do see some people maybe being underwhelmed by the reveal. I dare not spoil it here, but that’s not the films fault and more so the expectations of the audiences seeing the film. I think this film perfectly sets up a gloriously bonkers third act that has parts that had me equal parts creeped out and laughing hysterically and isn’t that what you want from a horror movie?
Approaching a review for a movie like Weapons is difficult because it’s one of those movies that’s better the less you know about it. I remember being pretty blind walking into Creggor’s last film Barbarian and being startled by it. I thought it was really creative and inspired and was excited to see what he was making next. He delivers with Weapons, making a movie that’s larger and more ambitious in every way. I’m not sure what it’s trying to convey on a deeper thematic level, but as blockbuster horror entertainment that is told creatively and is incredibly sharp and subversive- you can’t get much better than this movie. I had an absolute blast with it and would call it one of the best horror movies to come out in the past few years.
