Movie Review
The Five Nights at Freddy’s movie was finally released 8 years after it was officially announced to be in the works. The movie went from writer to writer and director to director with no successful approval from the game creator, Scott Cawthon, who wanted the film to be lore-accurate and faithful to the games. After all that time had passed, Scott finally settled on a director, Emma Tammi, to bring his creative vision to life. The story follows our protagonist Mike Schmidt (Josh Hutcherson) as he accepts a new security gig at an abandoned 80’s-style pizzeria named Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza Place, where he soon learns about its dark and unsettling past when its animatronics come to life. The Rotten Tomato Reviews are quite harsh towards the movie, giving it a plummeting score of 30%, so I decided to do a review on this film and give my opinion on it as both a fan and a critic.
The film is undoubtedly a love letter to its fans and it could incontrovertibly be seen through its amazing portrayal of the games. The film is filled to the brim with easter eggs and plot points from the games, giving in to some of its fan service, but ultimately being faithful to the source material. The Jim Henson creature shop did a great job building and working on the game-accurate animatronics. As a critic, the fan service, to a degree, hurts the film’s plot because it gives casual viewers missing and confusing information about the story, otherwise known by the fans of the game. Some more negative feedback is that the exposition of the film feels too long and played out and that there are unfulfilled stories and plot points yet to be told. I believe they did this either for the fans or to reintroduce these ideas into the inevitable sequel. As much as this film is called a horror movie, it really is a thriller because it focuses more on the plot than the scares of the animatronics. At one point in the film, they are actually friendly towards our protagonist and appear cute and wholesome instead of horrific and deadly. I also wanted a particular moment in the film to be more gory and bloody than it was to be more accurate to the games. Overall, if you are a fan of these games and their insane amount of unsolved lore, then you will love this movie but if you are just a casual viewer who just wants some scares, it is a decent watch. I would rate the film an 8.5/10.
Article by: Ethan Carvajal, Freshman
