Weapons director Zach Cregger: "Weapons is a really weird movie that goes to places I don’t think anybody would be able to predict”

After arriving in the cinematic big leagues with his 2022 breakout movie, cult horror hit Barbarian, director Zach Cregger has now returned with the eagerly anticipated Weapons. This time layering mystery into the horror, the story focuses on the case of 17 kids from the same classroom who disappear over night, willingly running away from their homes towards the dark, their arms wide open.

As the filmmaker explains, the story was initially inspired by painful personal experience.

“One of my best friends died very suddenly,” says the 44-year-old Virginia native from Prague, where he’s in prep on his next feature, an adaptation of the Resident Evil video game series. “I was unpacking all of that. I like to write for fun, and generally just to process what I’m feeling at the time. At that moment, I was feeling a lot of incredibly intense stuff.

“So when I started, I wasn’t writing a movie – I just wanted to get it out. I had the story of the these kids running away and this community left to deal with it. That very much represented what I was feeling, so

I wrote myself into every character, one way or another. But look, I’m so tired of a horror movie as a metaphor for grief – I feel like that’s been done to death.

“And I don’t think anyone who watches this movie is gonna be like, ‘What an apt metaphor for grief’ – cos that’s not what it is. But I was grieving when I wrote it. Still, the movie is a ride. It’s not like a slog, or a heavy meditation on loss – it’s a crazy mystery.”

Zach Cregger

The director has also mentioned Paul Thomas Anderson cult 1999 ensemble drama, Magnolia, is a stylistic inspiration.

“I mean, it’s not an influence on the story, but that movie looms large for me, just cos it’s such a weird, big beautiful mess,” says Cregger. “And like how it’s a movie with a very specific palette, and yet it paints with all these different colours. It’s hysterical, sad and mysterious – it’s everything. He’s packing so much into that movie. It’s unashamedly an epic and that felt fun. Honestly, the way in for me was John C. Reilly’s moustache – this one scene where he loses his gun! It’s raining and he’s panicking that he can’t find it. I don’t know why, but that scene felt like it was my style guide.

“In a weird specific way, that scene was like my first breadcrumb into something.”

In terms of the horror element of Weapons, did Cregger choose any particular movies as a model

“Not so much,” he considers. “I guess Hereditary kind of – I think it’s a total masterpiece. There’s a little of that in there, but when you watch the movie, you’ll see The Shining is big. It’s a mish-mash of all kinds of stuff. I think I’ve stolen from everybody!”

Starring Georgina Campbell in the lead role, Barbarian told the story of a woman who finds the rental home she’s reserved has been double-booked by a man, with the premises’ dark secrets gradually being revealed. It proved hugely popular with audiences and critics – but had the director been trying to make movies for a long time previously?

“I wanted to be a filmmaker when I was a kid,” Zach explains. “The path of least resistance led me into acting, and I did a lot of comedy acting. But I always felt, ‘When am I gonna pivot into what I really wanna do?’ I wanted to direct every show I was ever on, but no one would let me! Finally, I realised no one just gives you the keys to the car – you have to take it.

“I knew the only way it was gonna happen was by writing – so I just started writing script after script. I wrote a couple of things I loved, but I knew they were too big in scale. Then I wrote Barbarian, and I was lucky enough to have something that I think worked really well on the page, but it was also one location and three people.”

Were you taken by surprise by how big it became?

“Very much so,” he nods. “That was a movie we shot for $4 million in Bulgaria. My dream of dreams was that it would end up Shudder one day and hopefully I’d get another movie. I did not dare to dream it would be a theatrical release, and that I’d be sitting here in Prague prepping Resident Evil. It’s totally insane.”

Thematically, how does Weapons compare to Barbarian?

“I think it does compare, in that it’s structurally unique,” says Cregger. “Barbarian has a very bizarre structure unto itself, and Weapons is similar. It’s broken into seven chapters, and each one follows a different person rigorously. They slowly intersect and you begin to realise they’re all telling the same story. I haven’t seen a lot of movies do that and I think I pulled it off.

“You realise in every story, you’re following the same mystery – you’re just coming in from a new way. So it’s structurally unique. Also, Barbarian to me is almost a comedy more than anything, but it’s got a lot of horror. If we still had video stores, I’d be upset if someone hung it in the comedy section! Weapons is a lot more thriller/horror first, but it’s that comedy element is in there.

“And they’re both fucking weird! Weapons is a really weird movie that goes to places I don’t think anybody would be able to predict.”

The movie also boasts a brilliant cast, including the likes of Benedict Wong and Josh Brolin, the latter perhaps most celebrated for his role in the Coen Brothers’ masterpiece No Country For Old Men, an adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s classic novel.

Josh Brolin as Archer Graff

“That’s like a hall of fame movie for me,” Zach acknowledges. “I was such a big Cormac McCarthy fan – Blood Meridian is in my top three books of all time. And when No Country For Old Men came out, I waited in line to buy to book. Then it was like, ‘And the Coen Brothers – two of my favourite filmmakers – are turning my favourite author’s book into a movie?!’ Bullseye!”

For a variety of reasons, early production on Weapons was tumultuous, with Pedro Pascal being cast and then replaced, amidst other twists and turns. Did the director always have specific actors in mind?

“I don’t want to ever write with actors in mind, cos you don’t get them most of the time,” says Cregger. “But I had this whole movie cast, and then Pedro Pascal’s schedule fucked us up a little bit. Then there was the writers’ strike, so we ending up having to push a full year, and I eventually lost my entire cast.

“So I had to recast the movie a year later. The only person who hung tough with me was Austin Abrams. Thank god he did, and now he’s the lead in Resident Evil.”

Speaking of which, along with many others, I’m a massive fan of the series. Although previous cinematic outings for Resident Evil unfortunately rank among the extensive list of ropy adaptations, hit shows like

The Last Of Us and Fallout have proven it’s possible to do stylish and intelligent screen versions of video games.

“It’s such an honour,” Zach enthuses. “I’m such a massive fan of the games, so I want to just be as spiritually wed to them as possible, cos I think they’re so compelling. What I loved about the games that I didn’t see in the trailers for the previous movies – which I haven’t watched! – is that Resident Evil, and these survivor horror games, give you this slow, creeping dread.

“So I wanted to craft a story that was really living in that space. It remains to be seen, but I think we’re gonna pull it off. I love the world of those games, so telling a story in that setting is a treat.”

• Weapons is released on August 8.