'Weapons,' this summer's cinematic phenomenon, is a horror film.

Its director has said on several occasions that he wants viewers to go to Weapons as if they were unraveling a great mystery. Zach Cregger believes that if you tell us what his film is about, you miss half the fun. That's why it's difficult to talk in detail about one of this summer's big movie phenomena, an original horror film that once again demonstrates that some of Hollywood's most distinctive filmmakers reside within this genre.

The film cost around €32 million to make and has already grossed over €130 million worldwide since its worldwide release on August 8. That is, it has tripled its budget after just over a week in theaters. Thus, an original and personal film stands out from franchises like Put yourself in my place again or Karate Kids: Legends .

The success of Weapons also confirms that summer is also for horror films. It is almost every month now. This is demonstrated by the varied releases this year. Faced with the decline of superhero films, which are not achieving the expected box office figures this season, horror, much cheaper, has become a collective experience in front of the screen that brings audiences of all ages together in theaters. Final Destination: Blood Ties, the sixth installment in the Final Destination saga, released in May, surpassed €240 million and already has a seventh installment confirmed. At the beginning of the year, Companion and The Monkey arrived in theaters . This summer, in addition to Weapons, the sequel 28 Years Later and even another I Know What You Did Last Summer . Standing out among them all is a vampire film, The Sinners , a phenomenon (especially in the US) about the blues and African-American cultural history. Directed by Ryan Coogler, it has grossed over €312 million at the worldwide box office since its release in April.

Still to be added to the billboard this year are Together , already released in the US, but will arrive in Spain in October); the farewell to The Conjuring , the second part of Black Phone , Predator: Badlands and the youth phenomenon Five Nights at Freddy’s .

A year ago, director Paul Schrader asked on his Facebook profile : “Why do independent filmmakers only get funded when they’re scared?” Osgood Perkins, director of Longlegs , the most successful independent horror film of 2024, responded shortly after in a report in EL PAÍS : “It implies that horror is something minor and that everything has been said. But there is an appetite. There will be silly films, but horror is about infinity, about curiosity surrounding the great mysteries of existence, about things we can’t touch or answer. There is no garden more fertile.” Álex de la Iglesia, who describes himself as a fan of Perkins and Ari Aster ( his Eddington premieres in September), confirms to this newspaper the genre's creative momentum, not just commercially: "It's become the true place for arthouse. There are original, crazy stories with tremendous creative freedom. The most creative people are there. It's where you see things that make a difference, and they've disappeared from every other field. I'm only interested in horror directors now," he says.

Weapons is an example of this display of creativity. One of the keys to its success is the number of cinematic references it uses. In this sense, the film Zach Cregger has most often cited as an inspiration is Paul Thomas Anderson's Magnolia , especially to describe its structure. Weapons is also, like Magnolia , a tale of intertwined stories within the same community, from different perspectives on a traumatic event: in this case, the disappearance one night of all the children in the same class, except one.

Another reference Cregger points to is Denis Villeneuve's Prisoners , a dark tale of obsession and desperation about a neighborhood whose life changes when a girl disappears. It's from there that the director of Weapons draws his characters' outbursts of rage and his dissection of the suburban world. There are also classical inspirations: The Shining , the films of David Lynch and even JA Bayona's The Orphanage , for the prominence of children, the filmmaker explained on the Letterboxd platform .

Curiously, this very human and stark tale also has a fair amount of comedy. Cregger, before becoming a horror filmmaker, was part of a comedy group. However, laughter is never sought or emphasized, so not all audiences react the same way in the theaters. Some laugh, while others look at them with a "what are you laughing at?"

All these elements, in addition to clever promotion, have made Weapons the cinematic event of the month of August . A year ago, however, its future wasn't so promising. Following the 2024 writers' and actors' strike, the film, distributed by Universal, lost almost all of its original cast: the omnipresent Pedro Pascal , Brian Tyree Henry, Tom Burke and Renate Reinsve ( The Worst Person in the World ) all had other commitments. Only Austin Abrams ( Euphoria ) remained in a cast that would now be unthinkable to imagine with other faces: Julia Garner , Josh Brolin, Benedict Wong, Alden Ehrenreich (with a John C. Reilly mustache in Magnolia ) and, above all, the eternal supporting actress Amy Madigan, whose surprising and intimidating appearance in the film became an internet meme within hours of being presented. It was kept secret until its premiere, as they did with Nicolas Cage in the terrifying Longlegs .

Another key to Weapons ' success is possibly the iconography and personal mythology it constructs, with images brimming with movement. The imagery becomes iconic as soon as you see it, as happened last year with The Substance : the careers of its characters, Madigan's appearance, the rituals, and the way it shows, through subjective camerawork, how each character interacts with their world. Add to this the mix of a terrifying thriller with personal details from the filmmaker's own life, traveling from the intimate to the social. This makes it an authorial film with many interpretations.

The film was actually born from Cregger's need to confront the death of someone close to him and metaphorically refers to the addictions he experienced with his parents (and later his own as an alcoholic). Viewers will also easily see allegories for the all-too-common school shootings in the US, although he's not entirely clear on the meaning of some of the dreamlike images. "It's a film where I look inside myself and take stock of my shit and my life. It's autobiographical in many ways," the director admitted to the publication Slashfilm . Although not literally: "I don't think this film exorcises my demons, but it's given me the opportunity to understand other people's feelings in a healthy way. Instead of getting drunk myself, I can make the characters get drunk to avoid having to deal with their problems. I take my anger and make Josh Brolin [the grieving father] go crazy. It's better than doing it myself," he explained to Variety .

Cregger was already crowned as a rising horror director after Barbarian, his previous film, became a cult phenomenon in 2022. He achieved this with a blend of Airbnb social horror and pure genre skewing. Brolin, who is also an executive producer, was surprised to see that film, which he admits he didn't fully understand. But it was his children who made him see it differently, who made him understand the phenomenon. A few days ago, the actor gave a comment to the publication Collider. Another reason he thinks Weapons has captured audiences: “You always look for great filmmakers, and you hope there’s another giant out there. But with so much content, we only watch whatever the streaming platform puts out, and we’re like, ‘Fuck, why is everything so boring? ’ and you move on to the next thing. We’re always watching the same shit. And then suddenly someone turns horror on its head and creates something almost absurd, comical, that knocks you off your feet and has a huge emotional impact.”

Cregger is now preparing to sink his teeth into a multi-million dollar franchise, Resident Evil , with which he hopes to capture what he felt with the video games that inspired the saga. His new installment will star Austin Abrams. Meanwhile, Universal is sounding him out to return to the Weapons universe through a prequel centered on the character of Amy Madigan, whose point of view was left out of the footage (with more than two hours, Cregger thought there were already enough stories, and now he could make a grand move), reports The Hollywood Reporter . He also has more original stories written: Henchman , about a nobodies thug from the DC universe, and the sci-fi script Flood (Flood).