Five Nights at Freddy’s Finds Success as an Entry-Level Horror for Kids

The horror genre is a funny thing. Not “ha ha” funny, but scratch-your-head funny. For every thoughtful and intentional horror title, there are 10 splatter-filled, knuckleheaded throwaway movies. The latter usually earn more box office and immediate critical glee, but the former are the slow-burn titles that often find their audience after some time, when their more subtle points have been given time to marinate with an audience. Remarkably, Five Nights at Freddy’s belongs in the latter camp.

For those expecting a bloody carnage-fest with little to ground it, this is your warning: Five Nights at Freddy’s is not meant for you. This is firmly an entry-level tween/teen horror film meant to woo that age demographic into the world of scares with some edge and blood, but one that comes nowhere near what older teen and adult horror fans expect from R-rated horror. Not exactly a surprise if you know the work of director Emma Tammi, who brought to life the elegant and haunting 2018 horror film The Wind. She likes emotional stakes and an involving story, which her adaptation of FNaF has in spades. 

If you’re a long-time Five Nights at Freddy’s gamer, or coming into the franchise pure, the screenplay by Tammi, game creator Scott Cawthon and Seth Cuddeback covers both types of viewer. Opening with a Saw-light prologue that reveals the recent terrifying experience of a night security guard at the decrepit Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza, Tammi lets audiences know what to expect from her murderous animatronics gone amuck. Then the film downshifts into a more traditional narrative that lays the groundwork for tortured Mike Schmidt (Josh Hutcherson). 

Only in his 20s, Mike carries himself like an old, broken soul. As a child, he partially witnessed the abduction of his little brother Garrett (Lucas Grant) during a family camping trip and he’s never been able to overcome the guilt. He’s now the legal guardian of his young sister Abby (Piper Rubio), but he can’t connect with her—or just about anybody, as he takes sleeping pills to try to access what he thinks are his obscured memories of that day. 

Mike can’t keep a job, but he has to, or his opportunistic Aunt Jane (played by a gleefully wicked Mary Stuart Masterson) will take custody of Abby. So he accepts a sketchy job from his career counselor, Steve Raglan (Matthew Lillard) as the new night security guard at the now-defunct Freddy Fazbear’s. It’s kept alive by its unseen owner and financier, and just requires Mike to keep it clean and not let anyone in. It’s the perfect place for Mike to get more pill-induced sleep to work through his memories, which now seem to feature five little kids who know about Mike, and his brother’s disappearance. They also happen to mirror the coloring of each of the pizzeria’s five state-of-the-art (for the ‘80s) animatronic performance critters: Freddy Fazbear, Bonnie, Chica, Foxy and Cupcake. 

For tweens and teens, the overriding mystery is clear and easy to follow. More advanced mini-Sherlocks will deduce some of the third act reveals, but there are still plenty of other surprises and an emotional payoff that feels worth the journey to discover more of the “whys” of the intertwined stories. Hutcherson plays Mike with deadly seriousness. His obsession with the past is relatable, and he suffers for his folly of not recognizing the present-day sister he has to cherish. And speaking of Abby, Rubio does a fine job playing past her years, while also having the ability to convey the genuine delights of a child having fun with her disturbing felt friends. She’s scrappy and not stupid, calling out her brother with a sharp but insightful tongue that brings some much-needed humor. 

What about the scares? Robert Bennett, lead supervisor at Jim Henson’s Creature Shop, and his team bring the animatronics to life with old-school animatronics and puppetry that not only sells the pre-tech setting of the ‘90s, but makes all of the characters more sinister and visceral. Their performers do an exceptional job of delivering potent performances that say everything just with deliberate eye movements, eyebrow shifts or head tilts. 

The excellent lighting, editing and sly needle drops, like The Romantics’ “Talking in Your Sleep,” result in some great sequences that work on both the young and old. Plus, there’s a depth to the animatronic performances that allow the creatures to swing between being sympathetic and harrowing depending on their prey. There are some gnarly deaths that happen mostly in silhouette or mid-action so the impact is definitive without focusing on the gruesome carnage. Mostly, Five Nights at Freddy’s relies on a lot of jump scares, and scenes with building tension that result in cat-and-mouse scenarios, which are perfect for the age range it’s playing to. If you happen to have a kid that is way more savvy and exposed to intense horror films, FNaF will likely land less successfully.

For those wanting a gonzo, “animatronics from hell going on a killing spree” movie, Five Nights at Freddy’s is going to fall very short. There’s a case to be made that Mike’s trauma takes up too much real estate, but Tammi threads together the various emotional story points into a satisfying conclusion that services both long-time fans of the games and those just looking for a tight story that makes sense. There are questions left to ponder, and potential for more stories to come. But Five Nights at Freddy’s tells a complete story, which is a welcome gift in a genre that likes to be too open-ended far too often.

Director: Emma Tammi
Writers: Scott Cawthon, Seth Cuddeback, Emma Tammi
Starring: Josh Hutcherson, Elizabeth Lail, Piper Rubio, Mary Stuart Masterson, Matthew Lillard
Release Date: October 27, 2023

Tara Bennett is a Los Angeles-based writer covering film, television and pop culture for publications such as SFX Magazine, Total Film, SYFY Wire and more. She’s also written books on Sons of Anarchy, Outlander, Fringe, The Story of Marvel Studios and The Art of Avatar: The Way of Water. You can follow her on Twitter @TaraDBennett or Instagram @TaraDBen