FIVE NIGHTS AT FREDDY'S

CONTAINS SOME SPOILERS

Not that there's much to spoil in this nothing horror-comedy: beyond the specific rationale there's very little here that we didn't see in Willy's Wonderland, which was no masterpiece, or the Banana Splits movie, which was no better. Whereas the former at least had Nicolas Cage (but mysteriously it gave him no opportunity to do his signature routine of Bug-Eyed Shouty Freakout), and the latter tried to combine cuddly kid-friendly shenanigans with mean-spirited blood and gore, there's really nothing left for Five Nights At Freddy's to do. Which is exactly what it does.

Based on an apparently huge videogame phenomenon that I'd never heard of until this film's opening credits, Five Nights At Freddy's has schlubby loser Mike (Josh Hutcherson) compelled to accept a job as night security guard at a tacky pizza parlour (abandoned since the 1980s after several children vanished) whose main attraction was a string of animatronic robot animals that sang and danced. Mike is also haunted by the disappearance of his own brother when they were children and uses dream therapies to try and relive the abduction in order to remember a clue, AND is fighting to stop his evil aunt (Mary Stuart Masterson) from seizing custody of his young sister.

So there's a lot of character stuff to fill in - and that's before we get to the attractive cop who spends far too much of her nightshift time at Freddy's and who has a Big Secret. You'd perhaps expect that would make a striking contrast with the splattery gore as the animatronic animals bump people off, but strangely the horror element is half-hearted and very low on the grue (it's a PG-13 in the States and an arguably too-strict 15 here) and there really isn't much in the way of comedy either. But it's far too light and safe, far too devoid of actual nastiness, and so ends up more as a drama with occasional horror elements than an actual horror film (released for the Halloween weekend).

On the other hand, if it is really a kids' film then there's too much backstory about abducted children and psychological trauma: on some level these things are supposed to be fun and Five Nights At Freddy's really isn't. It isn't fun, or scary, or horrific, or very much of anything. There are a few moments where the potential horror is nicely staged but it doesn't deliver because deep down it's really not sure what kind of film it wants to be and what kind of audience it's pitching for. The result is a film that doesn't do very much and doesn't do it very well, leaving you wondering just what the point was. The second star is purely an indication of how charitable I'm feeling right now.

**