After Just 1 Day, Weapons Is Already the #1 PVOD Movie in America

Weapons gets a second wind on PVOD one month after its theatrical release. Zach Cregger’s suburban horror has also gained such a following that the studio has already greenlit a prequel movie.

Director Zach Cregger’s Weapons surged up iTunes’ top ten this week, ranking first in the United States as of Sept. 10 (per FlixPatrol). The film outpaced F1, Superman, The Naked Gun, Nobody 2 and Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning on the chart, just one day after it released on PVOD. Having earned $253 million against its $38 million budget, Weapons is on a roll as it continues to garner acclaim from fans and critics.

Weapons earned rave reviews shortly after it premiered, and that fueled its success at the box office. It’s overwhelmingly fresh on Rotten Tomatoes with a critic score of 94%, with 85% from the audience. Much of the film’s appeal is in its well-crafted, slow-burning mystery. Director Zach Cregger said his approach was inspired by Magnolia’s narrative style and Prisoner’s cinematography. He also thanked director David Fincher with a special mention during Weapons’ end credits.

“[Fincher] was available to me during prep, and then he was very available during the post process,” Cregger told Variety. “Dave’s attitude is, ‘It can always be better, and there are a lot of tools that you have at your disposal that you might not be thinking about.’ He watched the movie and had a lot of really constructive thoughts and gave me a ton of ideas. He helped me learn more about the editing process and how to think about it in a new way that wasn’t available to me when I was making Barbarian. So he just opened my mind up a lot.”

Zach Cregger Explains Weapons’ Dark Comedy Approach

Cary Christopher weapons (3)

Weapons
Image via Warner Bros. Pictures

Critics also praised Weapons’ masterful blend of suspense, horror, and a touch of dark comedy. That helped make the explicit and gruesome scenes cathartic, especially in the third act finale. Cregger admitted he removed “a couple of jokes” that would have ruined the tone of the film. “You have to just let them come organically to the situation that you’re writing and not try to inject anything funny into the movie,” he explained. “Be in service of the story, don’t try to be clever.”

Cregger teased that Weapons is an unfinished story. He’s reportedly developing a prequel exploring the villain’s origins. “I can’t help it: I have another idea for something in this world that I’m kind of excited about,” he confirmed. “I’m not going to do it next, and I probably won’t do it after my next movie, but I do have one and I’d like to see it on the screen one day.” He’s set to helm yet another Resident Evil adaptation, and fans of that franchise are optimistic about the upcoming movie.

“Those games pioneered something special,” Cregger asserted. “The pacing is so unique and effective, and just being locked in with one character moving from point A to point B, knowing you’re going to pass through this gauntlet of terror, and you’ve got to be methodical and thoughtful about it. That’s cool. That’s cinematic. So I want to tell the story in the world of the games that honors the lore of the games, but it’s a new story.”

Weapons is currently playing in theaters and is available via PVOD on Prime Video and Apple TV.