“A lot of people die in a lot of really weird ways in this story,” a mysterious child at the beginning of “Weapons” says, and that’s really an understatement for the two hours that follow. “Weapons” has a lot going on, and there were even more ideas in the film I didn’t understand until learning more about the director, Zach Cregger. However, the scattered thoughts of the film have less to do with the meaning of the movie and are more aligned with the director’s own creative process in its production.
“Weapons” follows a town after a mysteriously tragic event, where all students but one in a third-grade class ran away from their homes one night at 2:17 a.m. The movie picks up one month after their disappearances, and the town still has no answer, leading many parents to place their blame on the teacher, Justine (Julia Garner). Frustrated with the police, Justine and one of the parents, Archer (Josh Brolin), decide to take the investigation into their own hands. Through a series of random events, James (Austin Abrams), a local drug addict, stumbles into the story, finding the witch behind the devastation, Gladys (Amy Madigan).
When I walked into “Weapons,” I’d already seen the trailer, so I came armed with somewhat of an expectation of what the plot would be. I knew it involved school-aged children going missing and parents frenzied over why. This led me to believe, in some way, the movie would serve as a metaphor for the violence of school shootings. Although quite different from the supernatural evil in “Weapons,” horror has often been a genre to interpret real life issues through a different lens.
However, after the film, I’d been given more questions than answers. My original interpretation made sense in some ways, especially with the inclusion of a giant, floating rifle in Archer’s dream where he’s searching for his son. The time the children disappeared, 2:17 a.m., is seen on the gun. Some have then theorized that the number was chosen as a reference to the now-expired Assault Rifles Ban, which passed in the House of Representatives with 217 votes in July 2022.
Despite that, there still were aspects that weren’t adding up, so I began to research online to find out the movie’s intended message. In an interview with The Guardian, Cregger said that school shootings were not what he was thinking about when he wrote the film. Cregger has also said the gun imagery in the dream sequence is not intended to be commentary on gun violence. Instead, the idea came from his subconscious and is without a singular meaning.
Rather than being a metaphor for political issues in society, the film was actually a tool for Cregger as he processed his own grief following the death of his close friend and collaborator, Trevor Moore. Once I learned that, I felt as if I had a clearer understanding of the film. Addiction plays as a recurring theme throughout “Weapons,” such as with Justine’s alcoholism and James’ drug abuse. This reiterates Cregger’s personal grief in the film, given his own and familial past with addiction, now being 10 years sober.
To some degree, each of the characters represent a different facet of the grief Cregger was experiencing. Justine acts as the shame and guilt, constantly worrying if there was anything else she could’ve done. Archer represents anger and the need to solve whatever’s happened. Gladys serves as the center of the tragedy, with her magic symbolizing addiction; if she has one part of you, she has you entirely.
After finding out the more personal meaning behind the film, I still wondered about the implications of writing a story featuring mysterious loss within a school setting. Because the film was written using subconscious ideas in the midst of grief, I worry the film opens conversations it didn’t intend to and doesn’t have a response for. This confusing imagery then muddles the conversation about the main theme of the film.
Because I was looking for something that wasn’t in “Weapons,” I initially left the theater a little disappointed. But after doing more research on the film and its director, I’ve come to appreciate the film for what it is, and how personal film can be. Still, I feel as if the research I’ve done should’ve been unnecessary and that I would’ve appreciated “Weapons” more if it could stand on its own.
