- Starring
- Josh Hutcherson, Piper Rubio, Elizabeth Lain, Matthew Lillard
- Director
- Emma Tammi
- Rating
- Not Yet Rated
- Genre
- Horror
- Release date
- October 27, 2023
- Where to watch
- Peacock
Overall Score
Rating Overview
Rating Summary
The first game in the Five Nights at Freddy’s franchise, “Five Nights at Freddy’s,” was released by Scott Cawthon on August 8, 2014. It quickly gained popularity due to its unique and intense gameplay mechanics, becoming a significant milestone in the indie horror game genre.
Five Nights At Freddy’s
A troubled Mike finds work as a nighttime security guard at the now-defunct and dilapidated family fun center, Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza. It doesn’t take long for Mike to discover that something is very wrong at Freddy’s, but can he survive long enough to find out what that is?
Starring Hunger Games alumnus Josh Hutcherson, Five Nights At Freddy’s is moderately to well-paced with serviceable performances and sufficient scares. Hutcherson, who has struggled to find a place in Hollywood after his turn as Peeta in The Hunger Games, plays Mike Schmidt, a down-on-his-luck 30-something who is raising his much younger sister alone. This relationship, as well as Mike’s tragic past, which the movie wastes no time introducing, carries the film more than anything else.
From the first scene, Mike is made a sympathetic character for whom it is impossible not to root, and that empathic web is only drawn tighter as the first act continues. This not only firmly places the audience on Team Peeta but also raises the stakes and the audience’s sensitivity to the well-done but otherwise mundane cinematic horrors about to be visited upon Mike, et al.
Five Nights At Freddy’s isn’t breaking much new ground as horror films go. Like many that have come before, much of its momentum relies on inconsistent character behaviors and people making decisions that real people wouldn’t. Even casual fans of the genre will be able to anticipate the telegraphed scares and general story beats.
Far from perfect, it also suffers a bit in the second act from a subplot that is practically forgotten about before it begins and adds nothing but runtime to the core story. Furthermore, the film’s performances are all just north of adequate. Hutcherson, who gets the most screen time, seems capable of internalizing only two or three emotions. However, despite his limited range and unlike your blocks of wood like Halle Bailey in The Little Mermaid remake, Hutcherson mostly makes it work, largely thanks to the conducive material that demands only as much as he has to give.
Elizabeth Lail, best known for her 10-episode stint as Princess Anna in Once Upon A Time, arguably gives the movie’s best and most nuanced performance as the enigmatic police officer Vanessa. Unfortunately, the quality of her performance is in spite of the material instead of being bolstered by it.
Yet, as predictable and average as it is, Five Nights At Freddy’s also manages to be entertaining. It provides sufficient scares for those who like that sort of thing; the story is engaging enough for the audience to care, and the novelty is sufficiently fun. With a magic mix of mundane and just enough with a dash of something extra, we recommend Five Night At Freddy’s as Worth it, but with the caveat that it is worth streaming on Peacock rather than spending money on a night out.
WOKE ELEMENTS
Hutcherson’s Mike is relegated to a supporting role in the finale so that two female characters can handle the main antagonist. This hurts the film’s momentum, keeping it from building to a full crescendo. Thus, we knocked a few points off for wokeness.
James Carrick
James Carrick is a passionate film enthusiast with a degree in theater and philosophy. James approaches dramatic criticism from a philosophic foundation grounded in aesthetics and ethics, offering insight and analysis that reveals layers of cinematic narrative with a touch of irreverence and a dash of snark.
19 comments
Cari L.
July 5, 2023 at 7:49 pm
They’d better not mess up/wokatize this film, especially given that the games that provide the inspiration are made by a Christian
JulianSummers67573883
July 21, 2023 at 3:49 am
The film is literally Scott’s project, he can keep and remove anything he wants
TotallyNotDaniel
July 20, 2023 at 7:51 pm
hope theres no gluten free organic pizza in this movie… cant wait for wokeness to corrupt this film too like the fnf corruption mod
Cari L.
July 31, 2023 at 2:12 pm
Well, Scott’s making the calls on this one. As far as I know, he is a true Bible-believing Christian and won’t throw in any of this woke junk. For once, a male protagonist is actually brave (not a wimpy baby), and the female leads don’t overshadow the male leads. Fingers crossed, though.
Donte
August 30, 2023 at 8:17 pm
The new fnaf fans who don’t know the lore are not real fans
Lej
November 23, 2023 at 2:54 pm
It was honestly quite relieving to see a movie made in thia modern age that had no woke elements in it. And I wouldn’t say the finale was feminist at all, both the police lady and the main male character were beaten up and it was the little girl who saved the day, which is kinda cheesy but at least it wasn’t woke like it could’ve been.
Cari L.
November 7, 2023 at 8:36 pm
They’d better not mess up/wokatize this film, especially given that the games that provide the inspiration are made by a Christian
JulianSummers67573883
November 7, 2023 at 8:36 pm
The film is literally Scott’s project, he can keep and remove anything he wants
TotallyNotDaniel
November 7, 2023 at 8:36 pm
hope theres no gluten free organic pizza in this movie… cant wait for wokeness to corrupt this film too like the fnf corruption mod
Cari L.
November 7, 2023 at 8:36 pm
Well, Scott’s making the calls on this one. As far as I know, he is a true Bible-believing Christian and won’t throw in any of this woke junk. For once, a male protagonist is actually brave (not a wimpy baby), and the female leads don’t overshadow the male leads. Fingers crossed, though.
Donte
November 7, 2023 at 8:36 pm
The new fnaf fans who don’t know the lore are not real fans
Cory roe
November 8, 2023 at 11:21 am
My son made me watch it with him lol. I thought it was a good movie. Not great but good. I can say it was entertaining and different from what I thought it was going to be. I never played the games so I went into it blind.
No Baloney
November 8, 2023 at 2:28 pm
I can’t believe believe people liked this disaster. What a terrible movie. Really how hard is it to make a movie with killer robots from Showbiz Pizza? Instead we get some guy crying about his brother being abducted 20-years ago, and whining about not being able to keep a job. Everyone in this movie is hateable, and the script is beyond dumb. The only positive is that it’s not woke, although a female cop serving alone patrolling some deserted area of town in what I think is supposed to be the 1990s is pretty unbelievable.
The Nick Cage movie about this subject, Willy’s Wonderland, is WAY better and a lot more fun.
And that’s No Baloney.
Richard
November 8, 2023 at 2:33 pm
I watched this movie and really enjoyed it. I didn’t find it woke at all. No race swapping, a white lead who was a good guy and not a douche. No diversity tick-box casting. Even the ending I can forgive, especially as it is a trope of horror movies that the women save the day.
Cari L.
November 8, 2023 at 9:36 pm
AW YEAH, LET’S GO! IT AIN’T WOKE!!! Maybe I might (eventually) pluck up the courage to watch it!
Rod Munch
November 13, 2023 at 8:35 pm
There’s nothing scary in the movie at all – I mean, nothing. It’s like it was made for 8-year olds. Personally I hated the movie for that reason, but if you were holding off because it might be too scary, that’s a total non-issue.
Cari L.
November 30, 2023 at 10:25 am
That’s what I heard. It seems to be more of a thriller. I will be checking it out from the library when it’s on DVD.
Moo shoo
November 12, 2023 at 1:16 am
Just gone done watching it, little slow to start but not to bad for a lower budget type film. Not overly gore i think its a good movie. Think of it has a mystery thriller. Some good shots from the directory and art department did great.
No real woke i saw.
SHeikVoigt
May 14, 2024 at 10:20 am
I really enjoyed the FNAF games when they first came out. My friend and I would play them at our sleepovers! Now I’m an adult Christian conservative married woman who loves FNAF for all new reasons – Scott Cawthon. He’ll have my support any time he does something, but especially if I enjoy it as much as I enjoyed this movie.
I don’t feel like I have to go into playing his games or watching a movie he makes with the usual amount of caution I go into other things and it’s so nice!
The only thing I was nervous about was whether or not they were going to go the CGI way with the animatronics but I was so pleasantly surprised by the use of puppets! Then to see Jim Henson in the credits? It was no wonder how well done it was.
My husband is not really a FNAF fan, but he still enjoyed the movie and said it was surprisingly good and accessible of a movie for an adaptation of something he wasn’t really into. Which makes me so happy because I am absolutely dragging him back to the theaters for another if a sequel gets made!
From personal experience, it’s really hard being a game creator or writer on our side of the aisle, so Scott can undoubtedly count on our continued support! With the quality of product he puts out, he deserves it without question.