Review: 'Weapons' is a horror thriller that confounds, surprises and keeps the audience off guard as the shocks and drama build

My hope is to live long enough for medical science to understand fully how Zach Cregger’s brain works — because the mind that can devise such head-tripping horror movies as “Barbarian” and his loopy follow-up, “Weapons,” is capable of anything.

“Weapons” begins with an audacious horror premise: At 2:17 a.m. one night, 17 second-graders in a small town got up out of bed, went outside and ran off into the dark. A month later, they were still missing, and the town turns dark from the unexplainable tragedy.

Cregger’s script unfolds the story in chapters, each one focusing on someone affected by this awful disappearance. First up is Justine Gandy (Julia Garner), the teacher whose class all ran into the night. Actually, not all, because one boy, Alex Lilly (Cary Christopher), came to school the next day like normal. Both Justine and Alex endure grilling from the local police, while Justine also hears the taunts of the angry townspeople — one of whom paints “witch” on her car.

After we follow Justine through her unraveling, the next chapter centers on Archer Graff (Josh Brolin), a homebuilder whose son was one of the 17 kids who disappeared. Archer spends his time chewing over the case, rewatching the Ring camera video of his son running away from the house, and occasionally stalking Justine.

Later chapters focus on Paul (Alden Ehrenreich), a cop who used to date Justine; Marcus (Benedict Wong), the principal at the elementary school; James (Austin Abrams), a crack addict Paul arrested at one point; and finally Alex, through which we learn the twists in this mystery.

There’s one more person in this narrative: A figure in a red fright wig who appears in Justine and Archer’s nightmares. She’s played by Amy Madigan, who shows up in the flesh eventually — and leaves a mark as one of the most insidiously terrifying roles the movies have delivered since Freddie Krueger.

Cregger’s script doles out information in measured doses, never giving away too much too soon. And that’s not just with the scares and shocks. Cregger’s handling of character detail is also judicious — a prime example being Justine, who is introduced as a shell-shocked survivor but emerges as a complicated and not entirely likable person, for reasons completely apart from whatever happened to her students.

Cregger takes some big swings, particularly in the depiction of what happened that night at 2:17 a.m. — aided by the perfect disturbing use of George Harrison’s “Beware of Darkness.” But Cregger also finds room for sadness and some disquieting snippets of humor — which make the gory moments pop out even more effectively.

On paper, it sounds like it shouldn’t work — and there are times where Cregger’s ambition almost feels like it’s going to sink the movie. But those moments, a viewer realizes by the end, are designed to knock the viewer off-kilter while Craggier lays the groundwork for the audacious finale that makes “Weapons” one of the most surprising and emotionally devastating movies this year. 

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‘Weapons’

★★★1/2

Opens Friday, August 8, in theaters everywhere. Rated R for strong bloody violence and grisly images, language throughout, some sexual content and drug use. Running time: 128 minutes.