There are still good movies coming out.

Weapons is a supernatural horror mystery that is mostly about people acting horribly.  The premise is that everyone from one elementary school classroom, except one student and the teacher, go missing in the middle of the night.  Everyone suspects the teacher, and treat her poorly.

I am not a fan of the lead actress, Julia Garner.  She always comes off as a low-rent trash bag with a chip on her shoulder.

In Weapons, her character is the teacher of the missing students.  She is the younger teacher who thinks it’s important that she loves her students.  She is confident that her feeling matter more than her actions, and is irritated that everyone treats her like a low-rent trash bag with bad judgment.  Garner is excellent in the role.

The mystery picks up when the students go missing.  Miss Trash bag is the obvious suspect.  Law enforcement can’t find anything on her, but the parents are angry and suspicious.  The parents, police and school staff are all plausible, and act like normal people.

This isn’t a mystery that can be pieced together from little clues, but as the events unfold, all the little clues fit together.  The movie comes to a more-or-less gratifying conclusion.

As a supernatural horror movie, it’s creepy rather than excessively gory.  Like how a guy with his lips sewn together is unsettling even before he does anything.  The supernatural aspect is given just enough attention to show that there is a system, but not so much that it seems like something real people believe.

Weapons shows what can be done with competent writing and good casting choices.  The production budget for this movie was $38 million, and it made $266 million at the box office.  It’s comparable to Poltergeist with respect to the financials and the general feel.   Poltergeist had better soundbites, but Weapons has more memorable images. 

If you like that, then you should like this.  It’s about a 7.5/10, and just finished it’s theatrical run.  It should show up on streaming soon.