As a long-time fan of Five Nights at Freddy’s, the movie was certainly not disappointing, even though it was rated PG-13. It wasn’t that scary compared to the games, and although it had a different story line compared to the games, it still managed to entertain me. Warning: This review will contain some spoilers. If you haven’t watched the movie, I recommend watching it before reading the review. Anyway, let’s get started, shall we?
Story
The storyline has the same plot as the games; it doesn’t really differ too much from the games, but what really surprised me is that in this universe, Vanessa is William Afton’s daughter instead of Elizabeth, and Mike Shcidmnt has a sibling universe. Overall, the story felt okay; it wasn’t that dark compared to the original games, where they showed you the deaths on screen. In the movies, the deaths were off-screen, in the shadows, or in the background. You could see the dead bodies, which could be due to the PG-13 rating, but it did have some celebrity cameos, which was fun to see. The ending did feel a little bit rushed and fast-paced, as the villain, who we only saw at the beginning of the movie, came at the end of the movie, and I felt like he could’ve played more of a role in the story other than being in the flashbacks and memories.
Characters
The main characters were alright; they were pretty likable, and their lives were realistic. I felt like Mike Schmidt and Abby were the characters who were most well written because their dynamics and struggles represent what real siblings would act like and how people are trying to cope with the loss of a loved one and guilt. I didn’t feel like Vanessa was written well because I felt like her being the daughter of a serial killer could’ve played a bigger role in the story, but it was only mentioned once and never brought up again.
Acting
The acting was solid—not the best acting I saw, but not the worst. I feel like the villain of the story, aka Matthew Lliard, could put more effort into making himself sound more like a threat, and when he was injured in the story, he could have performed agonizing performances like he was really hurt because in the game it sounded a lot more painful and looked, but since the movie is PG 13, it can’t look like how it was in the game, which is understandable, but at least sound like you are extremely in pain.
The Animatronics’ Costumes And The Pizzeria
The Animatronic costumes in the story were on point; they look exactly what they look like in the game, but one small detail I didn’t notice was that Bonnie was light blue in the movie but purplish in the games. When I looked it up online because I was curious about the color change, I heard that he was always light blue, and it was just the lightning that made him purple, which was something shocking to me, but he still looked good, and the pizzeria looked exactly like the game. The people who worked on it did a very good job of making the movie look exactly like the game.
Jumpscares
There weren’t that many jump scares in the movie, and some of them were just in for laughs rather than to scare you. I didn’t think The Five Nights at Freddy would be that scary to me because I’m almost an adult and not five anymore, but everyone’s movie-watching experience is different. I just felt like the jump scares were just lackluster.
Overall
The movie was alright video game adaptation; now it isn’t the best video game adaptation, but it is certainly better than the ones I have seen recently these years, and now that the FNAF 2 movie is in the works, hopefully it can improve on the several flaws that the first has in it and make the second one a better horror film. In the end, I give this movie a 4/10.
