Weapons review: An unnerving and thunderously entertaining horror triumph

The hype only increased further following the onset of the film's cryptic marketing campaign. Ahead of a full trailer, Warners released more than two hours of security camera footage showing a number of children running away with their arms outstretched, with no further details or context as to what was going on.

It all led the film to be talked about with the same nervous anticipation that greeted last year's Longlegs, which benefitted from a similarly effective promotional push.

Of course, an in-demand script and innovative marketing can't always be taken as an indicator of a film's actual quality. But luckily – like Longlegs before it – Weapons more than delivers on its promise: this is an unnerving, riveting and thunderously entertaining horror epic.

The film opens in suitably chilling fashion with narration from a young girl hailing from the fictional town of Maybrook, who cautiously warns us that some of what we're about to witness will shake us – that a lot of people will die "in a lot of really weird ways".

She goes on to tell us that the tale began when all but one student in the third grade class of new teacher Justine Gandy (Julia Garner) suddenly and without explanation got up from their beds at precisely 2:17am one night and fled their homes.

The mystery of precisely where they've got to – and why exactly they've disappeared – forms the bulk of the film's 128-minute runtime.

To divulge any further details of where the mystery goes would be to severely dampen the viewing experience: it's a film best enjoyed knowing as little as possible about the destinations it arrives at. But what can be commented on is the interesting narrative approach adopted by Cregger.

The director has frequently remarked that Paul Thomas Anderson's Magnolia was a major influence on the film's structure, and the two films do share some storytelling similarities.

Like Anderson's film, the events in Weapons unfold from the positions of an assortment of varied but inextricably linked characters – offering a fascinating patchwork of overlapping perspectives that allows the film to explore the different and often complex ways in which people's psyches are transformed by broken communities, traumatic events and the public storms that surround them.

But while Magnolia is an apt comparison point in terms of the film's approach to character, this doesn't quite get across the impressive way in which the central mystery itself unravels.

With each new chapter and perspective – there are six in all, beginning with Ms Gandy and concluding with the sole child from her class who did not go missing – Cregger gradually teases out more information about the bizarre events that have engulfed the town.

The result is a propulsive, perfectly paced thriller that expertly keeps the audience on its toes throughout, leaving things tantalisingly mysterious until a brilliant reveal that will appeal most keenly to those horror fans who were bewitched by the aforementioned Longlegs. From that point onwards, things only get wilder.

Along the way, there are plenty of genuine frights. These fall both into the jump scare category – only the most hardened cinemagoer will escape a screening without leaping out of their seat at least twice – but also encompass more brooding, existential forms of terror, not to mention some shocking bursts of visceral violence.

As the film progresses, Cregger increasingly taps into exactly the sort of nightmarish, almost surreal, fairy tale-esque imagery known to keep frightened children up at night, and which in this case proves no less terrifying for adults.

One performance in particular that taps into this mode of terror – to say whose would almost be a spoiler in itself – is one of the most magnificently deranged in any recent film, and seems destined for a place in horror's hall of fame.

But as with his 2022 hit Barbarian before it, Cregger isn't only interested in spookiness, and he punctuates the regular moments of fear with clear evidence of his comedic roots.

There's a streak of black humour running through most of the film – perhaps most keenly felt in the chapter unfolding from the viewpoint of drug addict and small-time crook James (Euphoria's Austin Abrams) – and sections of the final act masterfully and gleefully embraces camp, to equally petrifying and hilarious effect.

It's the deft way in which he goes about juggling those tones – the serious and the silly, the panic-provoking and the laughter-inducing – that makes Weapons such a refreshingly entertaining triumph. Make no mistake, this is the real deal.

Weapons is released in UK cinemas from Friday 8th August.

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