Weapons
What’s it rated? R
When? 2025
Where’s it showing? HBO Max
Writer-director Zach Cregger helms this psychological and supernatural horror story about insular Maybrook, Pennsylvania, which suffers the traumatic and inexplicable shock of losing 17 children from a single third grade class who all simultaneously leave their houses at 2:17 a.m. and disappear. Suspicion immediately falls to the one child who didn’t run away, Alex Lilly (Cary Christopher), and his teacher, Justine Gandy (Julia Garner), who, as she’s shunned by her community, falls back into alcoholism.
The film’s construction is fun, telling the story from various characters’ perspectives, like Archer (Josh Brolin), a construction contractor whose son Matthew disappears; or James (Austin Abrams), a homeless drug addict and burglar; or Gladys (Amy Madigan), Alex’s eccentric aunt who moves in with his family. There are other characters and complications, and it’s a real mystery, but as it unfolds, it gets very weird and is a whole lotta fun.
I missed the film during its late summer theatrical run because we went to see Freakier Friday instead. Like Cregger’s first solo writer/director effort, Barbarian (2022), Weapons is unusual and surprising and plays into contemporary fears like child abduction. One might even interpret it as a school shooting allegory. Dark but entertaining. (128 min.)
—Glen Starkey
This article appears in Nov 13 – Nov 20, 2025.