Weapons - 2025s Best Horror?

We may be existing in one of the best years for horror in the 2020s. That sounds like a bold statement, but let me explain. Almost every mainstream horror movie releasing in cinemas this year ends up living up to expectations perfectly, think Sinners, Bring Her Back, 28 Years Later. Not only do they live up to expectations, they also bring something new and different to the genre and execute their visions incredibly well, which brings me to Weapons.

This movie is incredibly haunting from beginning to end and harnesses tension in such a way as to pull us in and not let go until the credits roll. Not only do they manage this, they're able to balance it with the smallest amount of comedy which is rarely seen or executed well in a horror like this. This comedy works to undercut the tension you may be feeling from a previous scene while simultaneously making the movie as a whole so much more interesting, due to the whiplash you feel at times. This is unapologetically silly - which is not something I expected to think coming out of this movie - while not throwing the movie too far into that rabbit hole like The Monkey from earlier this year, ultimately leading to that movies downfall.

One thing I absolutely love - and wish more movies weren't afraid to add - is the chapters. They work incredibly well to show us a wide array of perspectives showing different sides of this world, all ending with Alex, revealing all. One example of this that I love is Paul and his relationship with Justine. When she is the focal point, Paul seems like quite an innocent man who possibly once had a romantic relationship with Justine and is catching up to have a drink with her. However, when Paul becomes the focal point we find out that, not only did he have a drinking problem in the past and is currently working through that, he's also a corrupt cop who never actually split with his wife and ended up cheating on her with Justine. We're not told the whole story which is why we side with Justine when Paul's wife rightfully confronts her.

Another allure to the chapter element is that the filmmakers aren't afraid to completely switch sub-genre as they focus on a different character. We go from paranoia with Justine to mystery with Archer to tragedy with Paul to possession with Marcus. This is all so different, yet it all melds together into a beautiful harmony when we see Alex's perspective, closest to the culprit of these missing children.

Speaking of the children, let's talk about the story and metaphors that this movie presents. Before watching, I assumed that this would all be a metaphor for a school shooting, since it seemed as if all seventeen children had died and the movie itself is titled Weapons despite the trailers not showing anything that would point to that name. I am glad I was wrong and it's actually that people were being weaponised and it doesn't explicitly tell you what to believe in terms of symbolism and metaphors.

I loved the idea of parasites all throughout this movie. Mentions of parasites existed all through the runtime but was never the forefront of a conversation or even any scene, just like how Gladys existed in this town. It was only ever in the background yet it ended up being a big part of this movie and Gladys' motivations. While we're not spoon fed Gladys' reasoning behind what she does, it seems as if she was the 'parasite' and the people she was puppeteering were the 'hosts' as she was feeding off them to keep herself alive. Whether this was straightforward cannibalism or a more spiritual feeding doesn't matter, it wouldn't have changed the movie in any way for us to be shown any of this.

I did have one issue with this movie, though, and it's really not a big thing anyway. My one issue is that there simply isn't enough death. That's not to say this isn't gory or is boring or has too happy an ending, because none of that is true. I only mention this as it beckons back to the monologue by the little girl at the beginning of this movie. I absolutely loved this monologue as it felt very reminiscent to Romeo & Juliet's prologue. We're told exactly what's going to happen, just not how. It's immediately established that the point isn't to find out what happened, but rather to find out why and how, which in itself isn't even fully explained as to leave us questioning it all as we exit the theatre. However, my critique is that one line in that monologue is that "a lot of people die in a lot of weird ways" which I don't is very true. Yes, there is quite a bit of death but by movie standards it's really not 'a lot' and by no means are they very strange. However, it could mean that the manner of why they died is strange rather than how, since almost everybody who died did so because of hypnotism and some amount of puppetry.

Overall, while I wouldn't call this the best horror of the year, it's very easily one of them and will most likely be one spoken about and remembered for years to come. I'm excited to see what Zach Craggier has in store for the future, coming off the back of this and Barbarian. It seems almost impossible to top Weapons this month and I can see this very easily keeping a spot in my top ten of this year.