Rent Weapons (2025)

When Trouble Moves In - Weapons review by griggs

Taut, slippery, and full of wrong turns, Weapons sets itself up as a mystery-thriller before mutating into something stranger. The story unfolds in a Rashomon-like shuffle, each viewpoint adding new slants, half-truths, and quiet reveals. It’s the sort of structure that rewards attention—details that seem throwaway early on later slide into place with a satisfying click.

Julia Garner is the standout, grounding the shifting timeliness with a mix of vulnerability and steel. She has that rare knack for making even the most cryptic exchanges feel loaded. The first two acts are especially gripping, their tension built on small gestures, awkward silences, and the sense that everyone’s keeping something back.

Like his breakout Barbarian, Zach Cregger toys with structure and genre, pulling the rug out just when you think you’ve found your footing—but here the execution feels more deliberate, more mature. The final stretch tilts sharply into darker territory, seeds for which are planted early on. It’s not seamless, but it’s fascinating, and make Weapons hard to shake.

50/50 - Weapons review by ste

Once Mr. Cregger starts to let loose his revelations, though, disappointment creeps in, and the scale and soul of the film shrink before our eyes, the movie’s potential richness, kept in play by its ever-circling narrative style, is finally brought crashing to the ground by its denouement.

Effective yet Derivative Horror-Mystery about Missing Kids - Weapons review by PV

I liked this, especially the first and second acts. The third? Well... no doubt a horror audience demands that sort of money shot. It spoils the film really though no spoilers!

I loved the way it was told from the POV of various characters, their point of views of the same scenes are reminiscent of arthouse movies & stuff like Short Cuts etc. This is common in novels but not so much in movies, esp horror films, so I LOVED that intelligence in the script.

Maybe the movie overall reminds me of the classic British film THE VILLAGE OF THE DAMNED (1960) based on the 1957 novel THE MIDWICH CUCKOOS - way better than the 2022 TV series. The 1964 sequel CHILDREN OF THE DAMNED is also passable with an early multi-ethnic UN-style cast of kids.

Some have compared this to THE SHINING (1980) which I have always considered a massively over-rated movie. For a (male) teacher who's the victim of a witch hunt after false allegations just watch THE HUNT (2012) with the brilliant Mads Mikkelsen. Tbh I struggled here to 1) think a female teacher could be targeted as the one here - a male teacher, sure and 2) a teacher with a drink driving conviction and removal from another school would, in the UK anyway, be referred to a teaching panel and maybe banned from teaching for a while or for ever, or is able to return to teaching at primary school only with conditions.

CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND (1977) seems to be references a bit here too. This movie is a real mish-mash of influences. I was also reminded of David Cronenberg's THE BROOD (1979) with Oliver Reed and maybe The Sixth Sense too. Kids are creepy, basically...

Anyhoo, the initial mystery is nicely weird, and the image on the film poster is excellent - coming up with an original LOOK, with those arms 'flying' works.

The plot may well be daft and lacks detail - lots of sly plants here about parasites early on but the viewer is left asking WHY? All the way through, to the end and beyond. WHY anything. WHY this? WHY that? Especially when a certain character appears...

You have to willingly suspend your disbelief a LOT by the end.

Anyway, I enjoyed it, especially the first half, so 4 stars. A decent watch.

And I see I gave the same director's earlier movie BARBARIAN 3 stars so...