Weapons (2025)

 

While I was watching this movie, I was not sure if I liked it or not. There were a number of things about it that were intriguing, but it also seemed to be taking a long while to get to the point. I like a Slow Burn, after all I grew up on the films of the '70s, where everything was a Slow Burn. Weapons however, seem like every time it got to second gear it downshifted again. The reason for this is the storytelling structure of the film. In the end I've come down on the side that this is a terrific way to tell the story and I should get over my occasional sense of impatience.

I don't think it gives away too much to tell you that the story is told around six distinct characters. Also the narrative path is a little bit like memento, where the previous sequence means more after we've seen the follow-up sequence. Stories are interlocking, but they rarely repeat the same Beats. There might be a brief moment or two, that is repeated in each of the sequences, but for the most part they stand alone and give us the kind of context that make the events feel more real and a heck of a lot more interesting.

Julia Garner, Josh Brolin, Alden Ehrenreich, and Benjamin Wong, are all terrific in their roles as players in this horror scenario. As an unjustly maligned teacher, Garner is sympathetic but she is also not perfect. Her flaws make her a better protagonist. The only character who doesn't have an obvious flaw is Benjamin Wong, as the school principal Marcus. He is the epitome of an effective principal would be like. That of course makes it particularly disturbing when we see the first truly horrific scene in the film. Up until the part where Marcus loses it, our main horror element was dread. When the turn here takes place, it is fear and revulsion that take over.

There is a major character in the story that I'm not going to talk about, because it feels like it would be a spoiler. Although seen around the edges of two or three of the opening sequences, it is only when this character steps into one of those stories openly, that we start to figure out what the hell is going on with the children who have vanished. 

Director Zach Cregger, who previously made the film Barbarian, has interesting ideas and fun Concepts in his stories. And well they are admirable I'm not going to buy into the hype that these films are exceptional. There are still narrative problems, and inconsistencies, but Cregger does have the ability to direct the film well enough to distract us from those flaws , and still deliver something highly entertaining to watch.

For the first two thirds of the film this feels like a melodrama, posing as a horror film. Once we get to the final character story, The Narrative plays itself out straight, and the usual horror elements do appear. The climax of the film does feature several deaths, and disturbing images, and surprisingly a little bit of Hope for some of the characters who are left. I do need to say however that the film starts off telling us a lie, which distracts us from what's really happening, and then ignores the lie at the end of the film. As long as you don't mind being Hoodwinked into seeing a film that is not what is advertised in the opening moments, weapons will satisfy your Jones for a summer horror flick. It's not perfect, but it's pretty darn great.

Rules Don't Apply

Director Warren Beatty has wanted to do a biopic about Howard Hughes for years. After Scorsese put together "The Aviator"  more than a decade ago, I thought he would have abandoned the project. Instead, it seems he retooled it to focus on a different aspect of the legendary billionaire's life, and turned it into a fantasy love story where the main figure is only tangentially a part of the romance. Hughes is the most interesting character in this film, but he is not the lead. Earlier this year I thought that "Swiss Army Man" might be the strangest film I saw in 2016, we now have a worthy competitor for that title.

This movie is a disjointed drama which takes strong comedic elements and focuses on them without maintaining the tone very well. Hughes' eccentricities are a big part of what drives the story, and the greatest asset the film has is Beatty's performance as the sometimes manic genius/playboy that could give Tony Stark a few lessons in arrogance. Beatty is sometimes genial and quiet as he interacts with the two young people who have entered his sphere. He seems quirky and charming but not particularly mad. As the story goes on though, the quirks become obsessions and the charm turns into dangerous mania. Beatty has been a notoriously odd interview subject for his whole career.  In a Rolling Stone story in the early 1990s, his pauses and quirks were the featured players and deserved their own story. What he has done here is turn those peculiarities into a character that fits the billionaire eccentric to a tea. His performance is a combination of befuddle silences and questioning expressions as he sits in semi-dark locations and frequently refuses to interact with his business associates and confidants. I'm not sure how much is acting and how much is just Beatty putting his real self in front of the camera.

The two young people who mix in the life of Hughes are Alden Ehrenreich's Frank Forbes, an ambitious young Methodist from Fresno and Lily Collins who plays Marla Mabrey, a contest winner from Virginia. Both of them are employees of Howard but in very different capacities. She is a contract player for a film that Hughes appears to have no intention of ever producing, while he is a driver for her and eventually Hughes himself. When the story is about the budding attraction they feel for each other and the complications of their religious upbringing, is is a mildly dull romance. When Hughes stirs things up, it becomes more interesting but it takes so long to get to that point, and once we do, there are so many tangents that get followed, that the story loses any focus. Except for the song that Collins writes, we don't really get why Howard is drawn to Marla, except that she might be venereal disease free.

The film is loaded with stuff that I would like regardless of the subject. Most of it is centered in Southern California and Las Vegas in the late 50's and early 60's. As stock footage of Hollywood Boulevard from the era is rolled out in the background, I could remember the look of the locations myself, having spent a lot of time in Hollywood as a kid. There are some very nice touches as the town becomes a player in the story. The house where Marla awaits her big chance is in the hills above the Hollywood Bowl, so he nights are filled with classical music from the L.A. Philharmonic. Palm Springs is referred to as a dream destination for weekends  out of town. And the Beverly Hills Hotel, which still looks much the way it did at the time, becomes a place where Hughes can play hide and seek from the people he needs to speak with but won't. Cinematographer Caleb Deschanel gives an appropriate romantic era look to the proceedings which also does a lot to sell the movie.

The problems with the film are it's pacing and schizophrenic story telling. There are truly moments of pleasure as the story develops, but in the end it feels like the life Hughes himself must have lead, chaotic and neurotic.   The charm of the actors is not really enough to make the film come alive and it meanders around, showing a great sense of style but without any purpose. I'm glad I saw this but I can't say it is a good film. For every moment of wonder and joy, there are two that just induce shoulder shrugging and impatience.