Weapons director Zach Cregger wants Aunt Gladys prequel to ‘stand on its own two feet’
Weapons director Zach Cregger wants his Aunt Gladys prequel to "stand on its own two feet".
Weapons director Zach Cregger wants his Aunt Gladys spin-off movie to stand alone.
The 44-year-old director recently confirmed he was developing on an origin film for Amy Madigan’s mysterious villain with Warner Bros., and Cregger has now insisted he wants the Aunt Gladys prequel to “stand on its own two feet”.
Speaking with The Wrap about whether the Aunt Gladys prequel might lessen the mystique of the character, he said: “It’s crossed my mind. But I think that the Gladys story is such an interesting story that I think it’s going to feel very separate and stand on its own two feet, and I don’t think it’s going to diminish Weapons.”
Weapons – which stars Julia Garner, Josh Brolin, Alden Ehrenreich and Benedict Wong – follows a group of strangers whose lives violently intersect after a class of children mysteriously vanish at 2:17am exactly.
Reflecting on the reaction to the movie and the many different interpretations of his work, Cregger said he purposefully left the message of Weapons ambiguous.
He explained: “Here’s the thing that drives me absolutely crazy. People think that everything has to have some meaning, as if the movie is not about a witch stealing kids, it’s actually about something else. Where does that come from?”
Even so, Cregger disagreed with the idea that Weapons “isn’t about anything”.
He said: “It’s about a lot of things and it has a lot of meaning for me. But if I had to go out and explain any of the meaning, that would be a failure of the movie. You know what I mean? I have to let the movie be the movie. I can’t go and be like, ‘Did you catch that?’
“I did that on Barbarian and I regret it. After Barbarian, I went on podcast and I talked about what different things meant.
“I thought I was clever and I just feel embarrassed about that. I think that for, this movie, and probably for whatever career I have going forwards, it’s better to just let the art be the art and let people have their own relationship with it. I think that’s just a healthier way for me to live.”
Cregger emphasised he wanted people to come to their own conclusions on Weapons, instead of relying on him to spell it out for them.
He said: “Even now, even in this conversation with you, I’m like, Well, why do I have to open my f****** mouth and complain about people finding meanings?
“Because I should be allowing people to have whatever conversation they want about the movie. It shouldn’t irk me. I should just shut up. I really shouldn’t be a part of the conversation.”
Elsewhere in the interview, Cregger discussed his upcoming movie adaptation of the horror video game franchise Resident Evil, describing it as a “very simple story”.
He said: “It’s a hyper-subjective movie, is how I like to think of it. But it’s not in the first person. I think it’s narratively different from my other stuff, because it follows one character from point A to point B, almost in real time.
“Think about 1917 where you’re following one person on a journey. Except this is not done in oner, it’s more conventionally covered.
“With Resident Evil, I had the whole movie in my head, all at once. It’s a very simple story. I’m not a genius in that way. But it was just like, Yeah, this guy got to get from here to there. He’s got to do this job.
“I understand that and I could just get him deeper and deeper into hell as he goes. That’s a movie, and then I could start writing.”
