Five Nights at Freddy's (2023) - I have a love/hate with Blumhouse films, personally. I think the production company came out strong and allowed a lot of unknown writers an opportunity to get their stories heard. But Blumhouse came out of the gate fast and with that growth and opportunity, for budding creatives, came a lot of flat out stinkers. Five Nights at Freddy’s teeters on the fence of what may have been and completely falling flat.
This story, which is based on an extremely popular game franchise, sees a young man, who is raising his younger sister, going through the hardships of custody battle and maintaining a steady job; All the while dealing with the trauma of seeing his little brother being kidnapped when he was a child. All was not in his favor until a recruiter offered him a night time security gig at the abandoned Freddy Fazbear Pizza and Family Entertainment Center (think Chuck E Cheese).
I actually quite like the setup. It’s a solid premise that gets our protagonist, Mike, to Freddy’s. I am not well versed on the game and had to Wiki the plot, but it seems the movie is a rather faithful adaptation, minus the initial setup of the security guards' reason for being there. AAANNNDDD this is kind of where the film grinds to a screeching halt.
Wow what an absolutely dull movie. It is about as slow paced as the animatronics in the movie.
The pace is matched with not a single scare and it makes for a slog to get through. We are given flashbacks through dream sequences and family drama that interject the boring scenes inside Freddy’s that, even though we see each scene coming with such predictability, you wish that the action would pick up and surprise you at some point.
There is one thing I can give the movie credit for is the animatronics are well designed, and look like they are robots despite having physical actors in the suits. But ultimately, unless I grew up with the game or was a child, they are completely un-scary and bring no sense of dread to the more tense scenes. I also think the acting is well done and it plays rather dramatically for a kids movie with a backstory that is more on the adult side. It’s also filmed wonderfully, with great colors and it doesn’t feel like a direct to streaming film. Also, credit for taking the role but Matthew Lillard, as always, is fantastic in this for what little screen time he gets. You can really see him having some fun and I truly think he is underrated and I would like to see more from him.
All in all, I can’t really say I’d recommend this to any adult. It’s not something I would call even entertaining to watch because it spells out every beat that you find yourself scrolling on your phone until you hear something that may sound like it is exciting on screen. This movie was definitely made for the fans of the games and not much else (::cough::money?). For a movie about an entertainment center, you’re just not having a whole lot of fun.