Zach Cregger's Weapons has arrived in movie theaters to great acclaim — refer to WTW's Weapons review and the movie's 95% "Certified Fresh" score on Rotten Tomatoes as proof. If you're planning to watch Weapons this weekend, we definitely recommend you turn it into a double feature with Cregger's previous movie, Barbarian, which is streaming on Netflix. But you may want to hurry on that.
Barbarian is set to leave Netflix in the US at the end of the month, with the last day it'll be available to watch being Sunday, August 31. That means you only have a couple of weeks left before the movie heads to who knows where.
Showcasing a fun, unique new voice in the horror genre, here's why it's well worth your time to watch both of these movies as soon as possible.
Barbarian stars Georgina Campbell, Bill Skarsgåd and Justin Long, and centers on the guests at an Airbnb house in a rundown Detroit neighborhood that hides some dark secrets. I won’t go any further into the movie’s plot because half the fun of it is the surprising places that Cregger takes the story.
I actually just caught up with Barbarian for the first time in anticipation of seeing Weapons, and the praise for Cregger's voice in horror from this movie was deserved. It's quite creepy to be sure, but it also has a dark sense of humor and a thoughtful idea over who the barbarian in the title truly refers to.
Check out the Barbarian trailer right here for a quick preview of that:
Cregger's follow-up, Weapons, lives up to the potential the director showed in Barbarian.
Starring Julia Garner, Josh Brolin and a solid ensemble, Weapons takes place in a small town in the aftermath of an entire elementary school class going missing and no one being able to figure out what happened, but suspicions fall on their teacher.
Cregger once again shows he's a master of creating an unsettling atmosphere, as from the first moment you're put on edge and it doesn't relieve itself one bit for the movie's two-hour runtime. That's because the secrets of this story are expertly revealed bit by bit to keep us engaged, with the movie's horror elements becoming more prominent the further we get along.
I personally would rank Barbarian ahead of Weapons right now, but they are both quite entertaining. They're must-watch for any horror fan, but even if it's not your favorite genre (it's not mine), they're still worth seeing if you appreciate good filmmaking.
Again, for the rest of August, Barbarian is only streaming on Netflix (subscription required), and we don’t yet know if it is immediately going to be heading to another streaming service in September after it leaves Netflix (though the movie is and will remain available via digital on-demand platforms).
So if you want to watch Barbarian on Netflix before or after watching Weapons, then you need to make the time before the month is out.
