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"I was in post on Barbarian and my best friend died in an accident that was really hard to understand. Writing was just like an emotional reaction to that. I was spared, because of my emotional pain, of writing from a place of ambition. I was writing from a place of catharsis. Writing where the process is the reward. Not to write a movie, not to write my next project, but to write because I needed to get this venom out." |
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Director, Zach Cregger* |
Grief can be a powerful catalyst and writing can be so very cathartic. Cregger not only got his venom out, he successfully transplanted it into his characters who had no ordinary, explainable event to clarify the source of their overwhelming grief. Paraphrasing what the poster says, one night at the same time, 17 children from the same elementary school class left home and disappeared into the night. The poster says 'walked'. I imagine this sounded better than 'ran' but run is what they all did, arms out as if trying to take off. Now the more beguiling the mystery, the harder the film or narrative has to work to earn the answer to that mystery. The audience must conclude that something extraordinary prompted the children to run from home and movies do extraordinary in their stride. It's to Cregger's and his film's credit that the answer to the mystery is deserving of the praise and box office showered on the film. You only have to make a small leap to accept it.
The film is told through the point of view of six characters, Rashomon-style, with some intersections along the way… There's Justine, the missing children's teacher who becomes the focus for the parents' bitterness and unassailable grief. She finds solace in alcohol and old boyfriends but is targeted nonetheless. Then there's Archer, a grieving father in the construction business who takes on his own investigation convinced the police and the FBI have abandoned the case. Next up is cop Paul, an ex-alcoholic and ex-boyfriend of Justine. His wife is away and he agrees to meet up with his ex as she is in a bad way. Paul comes into professional contact with drug user James who's our next character through whose eyes we see the drama unfolding. James is desperate for money and breaks into a house with very unusual inhabitants and is eventually cornered by Paul once more. Marcus is the school's principal who's at the end of his tether trying to convince Justine to back off from Alex, the only boy in her class who didn't disappear. Marcus and his partner receive a very odd visitor after which things don't go well. Finally there's Alex himself and his role in the mystery is slowly revealed in a finale that earned every one of its horror credentials and handsomely paid off all signposts.
The cast is superb and also seemingly very expensive. All the lead characters have been in huge tentpole films but in Weapons they each get a chance to play someone real and each excels in their part. With the most dynamic arc of the five, is Julia Garner as Justine, the elementary school teacher whose class has vanished. We last saw her this summer, motion-captured on a silver surfboard. She is just as traumatised as the rest of the town but suspicion naturally falls solidly on her. She utilises a time-honoured method of shutting out reality, a Russian concoction this writer is all too fond of himself. Her car is vandalised and she hooks up with an old boyfriend, self-destructive behaviour that has consequences for her sleeping partner. She is determined to talk to the only child spared the fate of the others, Alex, (winningly played by Cary Christopher) but is singled out to be murdered, a fate she narrowly averts with some help from Archer. Josh Brolin's work is just as good. Consumed by grief over his missing son, his construction contractor is absent-minded, overwrought and takes on his own investigation which bears some fruit. His relationship with Justine softens while the more horrific events surround them. Ex-Han Solo, Alden Ehrenreich as Paul, a police officer and Justine's ex-boyfriend, is also going through his own crises. It's good to see just how good these actors are without the ball and chain of a monstrously expensive film to provide for. Ehrenreich's cop is a broken man and the actor makes us feel every little setback. Dr Strange alumnus, Benedict Wong as Marcus, the sympathetic school principal, tries hard to keep Justine away from Alex but events overtake his abilities to cope and let's just say that he's not himself for a lot of his screen time. I must give a shout out to Austin Abrams as James, the resident (and paradoxically homeless) drug addict and burglar who is the first to witness what is really going on in the town. I don't know many drug addicts but if I had to imagine one, Abrams fits the bill squarely and precisely. The last of the leads is an actress who was so memorable in two early roles, that I've captured her in amber and in my memory at that young age although she is instantly recognisable at 74, how old she was when Weapons was shot. She even uttered a line in Streets of Fire that I've always remembered… "We're gonna play a game, you Bombers are gonna like it. It's called 'Lights Out!'" followed by a pistol-whip across a goon's face. She also played Kevin Costner's idealistic wife in Field of Dreams. Amy Madigan is just as mesmeric as Aunt Gladys. But let's leave that there. I'd like you to find out all about Aunt Gladys for yourselves.
A friend of mine recently emailed describing a visit to the National Gallery while high many decades ago and while there, having an epiphany; this was that the frames held significance as the power of art was increased by the conscious choice of what to leave outside the frame. There is no genre in which this is more potent than the horror film. I watched the movie knowing that what Cregger put in the frame is not nearly as scary as what I imagine is just one whip pan or cut away... But it's never overdone. The climaxes to two dreams are more signposts than jump scare horrific imagery but they have a potent belt of their own. The director doesn't shy away from real body horror but in the context of a sleepy US town, the glimpses of terrible injury are measured and well rationed. That said, there is a killing in the film that cannot help but remind you of a weaponised fire extinguisher in a nightclub with a body part for a name and 13 – not 23 – separate blows. If that's not enough of a clue, have a read here.
Weapons feels very fresh and precise. The direction is never showy and only on closer inspection do you wonder how certain shots were pulled off so effortlessly. Cinematographer Larkin Seiple keeps the night shots in rich, deep shadow while the daytime scenes are far from stylised and cleave to being naturally lit and realistic in flavour. There's a sense of David Fincher's directorial style in that some camera movements mimic the actions of the subject particularly in scenes of kinetic intensity. The fact that you are never aware of the nuts and bolts of its construction allows you to commit to the narrative wholeheartedly. This is what a very good director brings to the table. He's well assisted in his job by film editor Joe Murphy whose employment of jump cuts never jars (you instinctively know why they are employed) and even given the six character point of view structure, his hard work is truly invisible allowing the audience to be authentically horrified, amused and excited in equal measures. There's also a directorial/editorial stylistic nod to Barbarian, the telescoping of time by keeping the subject locked in the frame and jump cutting to different times and locations. Cregger's not only the writer/director. He co-wrote the score with brothers, Ryan and Hayes Holladay. It's a very subtle score that serves the film as a sort of melodic nudge, a reminder of the intended emotional tone and it's not above being a bassline bed at times just to keep the tension ratcheted up.
Surprisingly, Weapons is also full of moments that make you smile with an emphasis on the very blackest humour. Cregger's background is stuffed with comedy so it's no surprise how deftly he weaves in little character moments that delight with their absurdity. If you're going to mix genuine horror with comedy, you really need to know what you're doing. While a character is being brutally murdered a few feet away, the person responsible wants to freshen up and is mildly frustrated by not finding what she needs immediately. Someone is chased by a group and the sounds of the screams become almost laugh out loud as witnessed by a neighbour cutting his grass. The strength of the film is that it is able to carry the horror and gravity of the story but still relax a little to allow the characters to breathe and be fallible human beings.
If you like your horror intelligent, well written with believable characters, taut and precise with a pinch of humour, then Weapons is enthusiastically recommended.
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