Five Nights At Freddy's (2023)
I’ve never played Five Nights At Freddy’s although it doesn’t seem too hard to get into. Whenever I’ve said it looks like it’s set in a really twisted 80s-era Chuck E. Cheeze, whoever’s listening invariably says, “That’s exactly what it is.”
OK. Cool.
Since the games themselves are fairly brief, FINAF needs a lot of padding to make a movie, and our audience character is Mike, a guy who’s had a tough time the past several years. His brother, Garret, was abducted, his mom passed away, his dad left, and he’s left raising his sister, Abby. Mike, who takes sleeping pills, has a “Visit Nebraska” poster over his bed and has the same dream every night, where he relives his brother’s abduction over and over.
Mike’s job record is dismal, as he’s been fired or quit from numerous jobs, and since he’s pretty much considered damaged goods, he doesn’t have a lot of options. His career counselor, Steve, does have a job opening for him, though, as a security guard at Freddy’s Pizzeria. The pay isn’t great, it means working nights, but Mike can be his own boss. The job has a high turnover, but no big deal.
Naturally, Mike doesn’t ask the super, super obvious question: “Why does the job have a high turnover?”
Nope. Mike is desperate because his Aunt Jane is hanging over him like a bird of prey and if he doesn’t get his act together she’s going to take Abby away from him. Mike can’t be trusted, she says. Heh. Fine thing coming from a woman who’s even conscripted Max the baby-sitter to spy on Mike.
And oh yeah, then there’s the matter of Freddy’s, a dark, dank place that somehow still has electricity and clean water, not to mention its creepy animatronic characters. Things get busy really quick, and those characters may or may not stay confined to Freddy’s.
I think the movie is going to hit differently based on expectations. People who are very familiar with FINAF lore may find it tame, predictable and haphazard. I have it on good authority that some characters appear in the movie that weren’t introduced until later in the series, and that the passage of time is much longer in the games than in the movies.
For someone like me who’s coming in with rudimentary knowledge, I found the film really enjoyable. It doesn’t go too crazy with the jumpscares, and it’s not too scary. I even laughed when a face-off with a psychotic cupcake was meant to be a jumpscare. It just doesn’t work; the cupcake is too cute. As long as it’s not chomping on someone, of course.
That said, the film does have some weak points; namely, it feels like it’s trying too hard sometimes, and it seems to forget which audience it’s really playing to. Then again, it doesn’t deserve the hate it’s gotten from critics. Sometimes we just want to have fun with a movie, and it doesn’t have to be Citizen Kane or Lawrence of Arabia to get us there.
Five Nights At Freddy’s is currently in theaters. Rated PG-13.
My grade: B
Principal Cast: Josh Hutcherson, Piper Rubio, Elizabeth Lail, Matthew Lillard, Mary Stuart Masterson, Kat Conner Sterling, David Lind, Christian Stokes, Joseph Poliquin, Grant Feely, Asher Colton Spence, David Huston Doty, Liam Hendrix, Jophielle Love, Tadasay Young, Michael P. Sullivan, Wyatt Parker, Lucas Grant
Directed by Emma Tammi.
Written by Scott Cawthon, Seth Cuddeback, and Emma Tammi.