Weapons

When all but one child from the same class mysteriously vanish on the same night at exactly the same time, a community is left questioning who or what is behind their disappearance.

The praise for Weapons is well deserved. The movie is an interesting ride and while not very scary there is definitely strong tension at parts. The premise is outlandish but this is more like a modern fairy tale than a straight forward horror film. The acting and cinematography are both good if at times a bit more comedic than scary. I don’t know what counts as a spoiler anymore so lets just get into it.

I enjoy the different points of view as it’s a great way to provide more context and a tight script can offer multiple meanings for the same incidents. This device is used to varrying degrees as both the cop and unhomed povs seem tacked on for runtime or to explain things to the audience early. I think there is a missed opportunity to put main characters in danger and add agency by having things happen to characters we do not really care about. The town is all mad about the teacher but this isn’t really present apart from the back to school scene and some vandalism on her car.

Part of this I believe has to do with forcing a theme of addiction as the unhomed man appears to smoke meth/crack and the cop is a recovering/relapsing alcoholic. I feel like this is handled better with the boy Alex’s pov where his parents needing him to keep things together could act as a metaphor for their addiction. The movie is confident in a lot of ways but I think these on the nose choices show some areas where the writer/director either wasn’t confident themselves or in their audience.

The other part of this I think is to limit the kill count to mostly include characters that we’ve seen their pov. I just find the officer and the unhomed mans’ behavior in their sections to be odd so it doesn’t work as well. I found some of their choices distracting.

I liked the part where Alex is keeping his family together again I think this as a meatophor for families dealing with addiction really makes sense. I enjoyed Justine’s character as a person struggling with addiction and having a flawed protagonist is always more relatable. I even thought the relationship she had with the police officer made sense and it was a good way to connect these characters. I think it would have been nice if this was also an officer that was still looking for the kids instead of harassing this unhomed guy. James the uhomed guy exists to figure everything out before any of the main characters and I find that odd.

The running style is ridiculous and memorable and I think it’s great. Gladys the antagonist’s design is fantastic and I think she’s an icon. The creepy kid makeup shown in the trailer is just Alex wearing Gladys’ makeup which I really enjoyed. She’s like a lady Pennywise but she does blood magic and knows the best way to stay young is to consume children. The scene where she’s lying next to someone in bed is soo good. It’s not that scary of a movie but come on this is nightmare fuel.

While searching for images to go with this post I saw there is a prequel about Gladys in the works and that sounds fun. It will be interesting to see if they have some meaning behind her visuals or if it’s just meant to walk as close to being a clown without actually having a clown.

I hated the gun in the sky. It doesn’t make any sense to me and I don’t recall anything happening with it later. Didn’t need it.

I hated that up until the climax the only people to die are the gay principal and his husband (see Bury your gays). The other non-antagonist characters to die are an unhomed junkie and a recently relapsed alcoholic. Seemingly not a movie that has a lot of love for marginal people.

I loved that the children chase Gladys through the town like zombies and eventually tear her apart in broad daylight. The visual of children bursting through windows and running in that pose after her is great.

I recommend this movie and am frankly happy that no kids are hurt.