Barbarian director's mysterious new horror movie described as "batsh*t insane" as first plot details are revealed

A trailer for mysterious new horror movie Weapons from Barbarian director Zach Cregger premiered at this year's CinemaCon, which means the first plot details for the film are now out in the world.

Per Variety, the movie stars Fantastic Four's Julia Garner as an elementary school teacher who arrives at work one morning to find her entire class has gone missing. The movie's cast also includes Dune's Josh Brolin, Doctor Strange's Benedict Wong, and Solo: A Star Wars Story's Alden Ehrenreich.

In the trailer, which was shown behind closed doors, an ominous child's voiceover reportedly tells us that "Mrs. Gandy’s room was totally empty. Because the night before, at 2.17 am, every kid woke up, got out of bed, walked downstairs and into the dark, and they never came back."

Variety writes, "We can’t stress how upsetting some of this footage was – featuring children sleepwalking giddily as if possessed, running into the pitch dark. The final moments of the trailer revealed a terrifying figure hiding deep in the woods, one that looked overwhelmingly like a female clown."

As part of the CinemaCon presentation, New Line Cinema boss Richard Brener described the film as "intriguing and unpredictable, with a nice helping of batshit insane", while Cregger said the project was "a movie that unravels and reinvents itself as it goes."

Cregger's last time in the director's chair was for 2022's Barbarian, which was a hit with both critics and at the box office, and follows a woman who realizes her Detroit Airbnb hides an extremely dark secret.

Weapons will arrive in theaters on August 8. For more, fill out your watchlist with our picks of the other best upcoming horror movies coming our way in 2025.