When a Witch Is Just a Witch

Broad Spoiler Alert for Weapons

****Broad Spoiler Alert for Weapons***

Whenever a man writes a witch movie, you should be suspicious.

I’ve said before, I have an English degree, which means I have a degree in reading too much into things.

So we’re back with another critique of a scary movie, and coincidentally another one with Julia Garner! (You can also read my thoughts on Wolf Man.)

This time I’m thinking about Weapons.

I originally wasn’t going to watch this movie because the idea of children and weapons in a movie seems like a recipe for discomfort and rage, especially if not done well.

First Thoughts

Not only does the movie do a relatively lazy job of living up to its title, the director himself (Zach Cregger) said “It’s not his business what people make of the movie.”

All this despite a giant assault rifle floating above a house in the middle of the movie? Come on, dude, own up to it.

There is mention that the origin of the movie is deeply personal. Which also, to me, falls flat. I’m curious about the need to turn your specific personal grief into a half-hearted metaphor about school violence.

As an allegory for school shootings, I don’t think a childless, old woman makes the most immediate sense as a representative villain. Given that something like 95% of mass shooters are cis white dudes…it couldn’t have been a Warlock, Cregger? Had to be a woman?

The Witch

Back to my original statement: When a man writes a witch movie, you should be suspicious. Especially when he doesn’t want to unpack the images he landed on.

Gladys is a hallmark witch trope when you boil it down to the details and is easily read as an allegory for how childless, single, old women are the downfall of society.

Consider:

• She wears garish makeup, which reads as a failed attempt at expected femininity. More than that, it looks like a clown so she looks even more inhuman.

• She (presumably) has no children, and worse, is kidnapping other people’s children.

• She literally destroys the nuclear family of the child protagonist.

• She is selfish and doesn’t care for the other people in her home.

• She drains energy from other people to maintain her own vitality (or beauty).

These are all very predictable, classic aspects of a fairytale witch. These are things women get critiqued for all the time: failing to play the beautiful, submissive mother with traditional family values.

It’s clear that Gladys is meant to be a parasite. Which I judged by Justine teaching a lesson about parasites and the way Gladys drains people, like a parasite.

Obviously, I have a bias, but it’s all too easy to read this as a metaphor for childless, single women being parasites on society. I think it does more than that, but that aspect is still there.

Conclusions

I would like to think Cregger did not intentionally decide to make a woman his villain as an anti-feminist statement. But, our unconscious leanings often reveal a lot about what we’ve internalized about the world around us. (Same can be said about my own bias looking at this movie…)

I don’t think Weapons is a particularly revolutionary movie in this current political climate, in fact it may subtly do more harm than good. It’s ultimately the main child protagonist and his fellow children who deal with the problem in the movie. The adults are as good as useless. That’s not really a solution for gun violence in real life. Although, does art owe us solutions?

If anything, I resonate with the idea of Gladys as an allegory for addiction and could see a reading of the movie that says our addiction to consumption (particularly with our culture’s fetishization of trying to buy perpetual beauty/youth) is letting the next generation down. Classic fairytale witch stuff.

However, I think adding in the school violence elements was a lazy attempt to be topical and offers no real critique on the very real danger our students face in the United States.

But of course, could a man really make a movie just about processing his feelings? That would be too vulnerable, wouldn’t it?

I do think Cregger should take more responsibility for how his movie reads to other people, that’s literally the point of making art. I think it sounds a little shallow to just “Hope people have fun,” with this movie, when it’s clearly pointing people toward some of the darker griefs in our society. That feels like missing the mark to me. Especially if he’s already planning a sequel…

Art is a tool for communication, and if you don’t care about communicating clearly or what impact it will have, why are you making it at all?

Rating

All that being said: 7/10. The ending chase scene gave it a bonus point.