Double Feature: Weapons and Eenie Meanie (2025) Reviews

What did Sam do when he realised he couldn't get enough words out of a Weapons review without going into spoilers? He paired it with another new release!

Aug 28, 2025

Weapons (2025)

Director: Zach Cregger

Screenwriter: Zach Cregger

Starring: Julia Garner, Josh Brolin, Alden Ehrenreich, Benedict Wong, Amy Madigan, Austin Abrahams, Cary Christopher

by Sam Sewell-Peterson

We really haven’t had a good [redacted] horror in a while. Yes, we’re going to avoid talking about exactly what kind of horror film this is for the sake of the spoiler-adverse. Three years ago, writer-director Zach Cregger came out of nowhere with Barbarian and blew horror fans’ tiny little minds. Now he’s back to do it again with Weapons, which is a much more dialled-back affair…until it isn’t.

Telling the story of a class of children who run out and disappear during the night, we follow a teacher (Julia Garner), a parent (Josh Brolin), a cop (Alden Ehrenreich), an addict (Austin Abrahams) and a principal (Benedict Wong) in turn as they delve into the strange goings on in their town. This might be a bit of a slow burn, but it’s worthwhile if you stick with it.

You become aware of uncomfortable shifting in seats watching Weapons in a room full of other people, which is definitely the intended reaction in this intense, two hour movie. Aside from a couple of dream sequence jump-scares, the first half of the film doesn’t have much in the way of horror imagery at all. At this point it’s a social horror examining what a traumatic event can do to a small, tightly-knit community and how it can cause them to turn on each other in their fear and paranoia.

Then, about two thirds of the way through, as we are on the fourth of six character-focused chapters, there is a palpable shift. The creeping dread gives way to explicit terror and the revelation about what exactly has been going on provides ample opportunity for grisly violence and traumatising assaults on the body. As we found from the twisted sights he subjected his audience to in that basement in Barbarian, Zach Cregger doesn’t screw around on the horror front, and in fact takes perverse glee in injecting something very wrong into seemingly mundane situations.

Clearly taking cues from such diverse influences as Steven King to David Lynch, European folklore and even Roald Dahl, Cregger’s film probably isn’t the one you’re expecting (this is not another Barbarian and lacks the kind of sheer adrenaline thrills found there), but not having any idea where Weapons is going from one moment to the next is no bad thing.

Having pretty much all of your outright horror confined to the final act won’t please everyone, but when this talented ensemble (Garner and Ehrenreich being the highlights) bring to life such a fascinating array of characters so viscerally, and the atmosphere is this oppressive despite the plot taking its sweet time to unfurl, you’re still left with a pretty compelling and hard-hitting horror-inflected drama.

Score: 7.5/10

Eenie Meanie (2025)

Director: Shawn Simmons

Screenwriter: Shawn Simmons

Starring: Samara Weaving, Karl Glusman, Andy Garcia, Steve Zahn, Jermaine Flower, Marshawn Lynch, Randall Park

Even though they’re usually dumped on Hulu/Disney+ without much ceremony these days, movies from 20th Century Studios - often quite daring genre fare without a guaranteed audience - are still frequently worth your time.

In Eenie Meanie (it’s the lead character’s nickname) Samara Weaving plays Edie, a former foster kid forced into being the getaway driver in a casino heist after her small-time criminal ex-boyfriend John (Karl Glusman) makes a costly mistake that puts him in the crosshairs of gangster Nico (Andy Garcia).

As she proved with gusto in Ready or Not, as well as being a commanding screen presence, Weaving is a master of comic timing in dark situations, such as the moment in this film when Edie skittishly asks on her arrival in a derelict building frequented by criminals, “Is that a human-sized box?”. She has some good chemistry with Glusman’s John as well, though you’ve no idea why she ever ended up with this loser, introduced to us being chased stark naked through an apartment block by heavily-armed thugs. In a nice reference to Steven Soderbergh’s Ocean’s Eleven, Andy Garcia is the mob boss masterminding a daring casino robbery who has both protected and exploited Edie since her teenage years and who sees John as a useful idiot. Expecting a slick montage with the gang gathered around a map and making their plans? You got it.

The film is packed full of colourful characters, many of which have more layers than you’re used to seeing in what could quite easily be a throwaway crime-comedy. There are some surprises in the second half, and while not every plot turn or character decision passes muster, it’s well paced and deploys its earnest moments and sudden shocks of violence effectively.

The script perhaps isn’t quite up there with the best of the genre typified by the likes of the Coen Brothers (Shawn Simmons seems to have less disdain than they do for stupid lawbreakers), but good performances, a couple of killer car chases and surprising emotional hits in the film’s final stretch still makes Eenie Meanie a very enjoyable way to spend an evening.

Second Cut

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