In Focus Magazine Movie Reviews

02/02/2024

Sometimes I Think About Dying
Movie Review

The Oregon coast, a haven for solitude and solitary people, is where Director Rachel Lambert sets her newest indie film, Sometimes I Think About Dying. If the somber title doesn't disturb you, but rather, intrigues you, you may be just the audience for a film filled with wistful loners, who aren't really searching for anything more than what they already have.

It's a film filled with awkward encounters, people who may laugh too loudly at inappropriate times, people who say the absolute wrong thing, not to be hurtful, but because they are socially inept. She's not shy, she just prefers to keep herself to herself.

People who are simply average, living average lives, having uncomfortable conversations. People like Fran (Daisy Ridley), a potentially suicidal woman working in a small office, who loves her job creating spreadsheets. After all, numbers can't lie. Numbers are predictiable. Numbers have no feelings.

Fran's clothing is monochromatic. Her desk space is monochromatic. Her home is monochromatic. She's so bland her favorite food is ... cottage cheese.

You get the idea. Fran's life has been colorless for many years. In fact, she grew up in the "quiet" part of the town, so the sometimes boisterous conversations in her small office can be overwhelming. She's not stupid. In fact, she's very witty, but sometimes her comments go over the heads of her co-workers. And she's left, like most of us in that situation, regretting her words. Fran has spent most of her life living inside her own head, so social interactions are a distraction she tries to avoid.

At office gatherings, she stands off to the side, quietly walks in to take a piece of cake, and quickly leaves the room, walking back to her desk. And yes, dreams about dying. Thinks about it while she's awake. Dreams about it while she's asleep. She's a victim of a possible shipwreck, a snakebite, or just a body decaying in the silent woods. In fact, these dreams/hallucinations are more colorful than her daily existence.

Every day she comes home from work, pours a glass of wine without taking off her coat or putting down her purse. She sits on her couch and plays Soduku, always in bed by a 'reasonable' hour. She make her bed every morning. She has never had a relationship, doesn't know what love feels like.

And then a new employee, Robert (Dave Merheje) appears in the office, taking the spot of a recently retired co-worker. Robert is very much an extrovert, joking with everyone from day one. Robert makes friends easily. Robert starts flirting with Fran, who simply doesn't know how to respond. He flirts in person, he flirts by email, he flirts by text message. Anything to get her attention. He confesses things to Fran, which brings them closer. Eventually he asks her out on a date.

In one scene, Fran and Robert attend a murder mystery party on a houseboat. Fran is dubbed the 'murder victim' in one scenario, and visibly impresses the other guests by the gruesome description of her own 'death'. Though out of her comfort zone, her wit is fully on display, taking Robert by surprise.

Overall, it's a very subtly nuanced performance by Ridley.

However, the socially inept Fran doesn't know how to handle the romatic attention from this twice-divorced man. He's not pushy, he's very kind. He's also, admittedly, inept when it comes to relationships. Now, you may be thinking, maybe they're really deep thinkers, with huge emotional storehouses just waiting to be released. Or maybe they're just built more simply - what you see is what you get.

You'll have to check out Sometimes I Think About Dying to find the answers.

https://www.infocus-magazine.com/news/763/Sometimes-I-Think-About-Dying.html

26/01/2024

Freud's Last Session
In Focus Magazine Movie Reviews

Freud's Last Session begins two days after Germany has invaded Poland., British children are being evacuated out of London to the countryside for safekeeping.

Sigmund Freud (Anthony Hopkins) has evacuated his Vienna homeland with his daughter Anna, so they can both practice in England. However, he is not anticipating much of a future. He has a painful, inoperable tumor in his eye and cheek. Neville Chamberlin has declared that Great Britain will go to war with Germany because Hi**er will not withdraw from Poland. Freud is feeling the encroaching darkness within and without. He feels his time is short.

It is on this night that Professor C.S. Lewis (Matthew Goode), has come to debate Freud on the existence of God. No matter what character Hopkins inhabits, challenging him to a war of words and wits is always a losing proposition. And the man with the cigar is no exception.

Lewis, a believer in the Holy Spirit, challenges Freud's world view, one in which God is not benevolent and does not even exist. Says Freud, "Do non-believers bring about their own suffering or is their suffering God's revenge for their disbelief?" Exasperated, he goes even further, "There's so much pain in the world, is this God's plan?" Freud has suffered horrible losses throughout his life, and embraces science, not theology.

At some point in time, before Lewis appears at Freud's home, the Gestapo have already come to 'question' Dr. Freud. His daughter, Anna, volunteers to go with them in his place, secreting in her clothing one of her father's secret poison pills, just in case. The horror is closing in.

Based on the play by the screenwriter Marc St. Germain, Freud's Last Session is a dash through Freudian Psych 101, including discussions on psychotic personality disorders. Freud expounds on homosexuality and lesbianism, finding all of these, and more, are a natural part of human sexuality. Freud 'considers what people tell him less interesting than what they choose not to tell him.'

Freud surreptitiously starts to analyze and question Lewis, whose explanation of why he is there has something to do with the author Tolkein. Hopkins is so sly about the questioning that Lewis has no idea he's being analyzed. Asks Freud, "Why should I take the word of Christ that he is God, while I diagnose men (as psychotics) who claim to be Christ?" Freud also has little truck with fake religious piety. "You always pick and choose those special Bible verses, the ones that support your own virtuous bias."

There's so much to unpack, on a psychological level. Anna's relationship with her father is portrayed as definitely skewed; he still views his adult daughter as a child needing his approval, although Anna is actually in a relationship with another adult. Freud knows her partner is a woman, but Anna is afraid to reveal that to her father. Freud is definitely unwilling to talk with Lewis about his relationship with his daughter/caretaker.

While this theological battle is being waged, Anna is running through the village, on the hunt for a bottle of morphine to assuage her father's pain. She is repeatedly turned away, even though, or possibly because she mentions her Jewish father by name.

The verbal parallels between the terror of 1940's German Na**sm and the rhetoric from one political faction in America, eighty years later, are strewn like landmines. Says Freud, "We've chosen to live our precious lives in the stifiling smoke of the burning of the books and the embers of our hate. We are the apocalypse. Herr Heil."

Above and beyond the political overtones, it's the thrill of watching Hopkins and Goode's verbal fencing that makes Freud's Last Session captivating.

https://www.infocus-magazine.com/news/762/Freuds-Last-Session.html

24/01/2024

The Academy NOT nominating either Gerwig or Robbie but nominating Gosling proves the entire point of Barbie.

17/01/2024

https://mailchi.mp/e8d7826c267d/john-waters-to-be-honored-by-american-cinema-editors?e=1ab2cd4691

          LOS ANGELES (Jan. 17, 2024) – American Cinema Editors (ACE) announced today that the organization will honor acclaimed director John Waters with the esteemed ACE Golden Eddie Filmmaker of the Year Award, recognizing an artist who exemplifies distinguished achievement in the art and ...

11/01/2024

The Beekeeper
Movie Review

If you're a producer in Hollywood and you want an action-packed film, the current writer of choice is Kurt Wimmer, whose film The Beekeeper just hit the big screen. With previous hits like Law Abiding Citizen and Expen4bles, Wimmer knows how to keep his story tight and his fight scenes explosive.

And The Beekeeper, starring Jason Statham, is no exception. Almost everyone in this film, male and female is a bad-ass.

Built around the premise that the only thing that might be worse than beating a puppy is scamming a senior, Statham wreaks almost 2 hours of havoc on those who have fatally wronged the people he cares about, all while almost never breaking a sweat. Though in that time he does break many noses, fingers, and ankles.

United Data Group are the big money-making scammers, overseen by Wallace Westwyld (Jeremy Irons). What exactly does UDC do? Well, you know how you're always warned NOT to click on unknown links? They're the company that sends you the unknown weblinks and attachments, infecting and hijacking your computer and draining your bank accounts.

The Beekeepers is the code name for the secret elite force within a secret government agency who even the secret keepers know little about. But what they do know scares the crap out of them; Adam Clay (Statham) was the best of the Bees, one who never fails to protect the Hive. When those in goverment positions put out the word, for their own financial reasons, that Beekeeper Clay has gone rogue, they send a number of legit and illegitimate armies to take him down and, more importantly, shut him up quickly.

But they didn't realize that Clay, who only wanted to retire to his quiet life of beekeeping and honeycombs, is still the A-team Bee. In fact, he's the single member of this Bee team, dispatching multiple teams of nasty buzzing hornets left and right, smoking out the people who make their massive fortunes stealing other people's money.

There are times when the script gets a little bit "Wick-y" in that other Bees are sent to take out this particular Bee, for a fee. Think "High Table" but definitely not as classy. Agents Verona Parker and Matt Wiley (Emmy Raver-Lampman and Bobby Naderi) are cast as the duo who are determined to smoke out Clay, but will Parker do her job or do right by her mother?

Once Clay starts to follow the money trail, he's busy kicking the hornet's nest, one that has been skillfully hidden in the shadowy eaves of those at the highest level of power.

https://www.infocus-magazine.com/news/761/The-Beekeeper.html

03/01/2024

The third annual winners of the Critics Association of Central Florida (CACF) Awards. 2023 | 2022 | 2021 ...

11/12/2023

Poor Things
Movie Review by Lisa Blanck

When we are first introduced to Emma Stone's Bella Baxter, she is spitting up her food, stumbling on her feet like a toddler and has little, if any, motor coordination. She has tantrums and breaks things. When she babbles out her few unintelligible words, she manages to refer to her benefactor, Dr. Godwin Baxter (Willem Defoe) as “God”. Whether she sees him as her God because he provides for her every desire and overlooks her extremely odd, childish behavior, has taken to calling him God because she can't manage to say Godwin, or because he, well, we can't get into that because it would give too much away, matters not.

But make no mistake, this is an Oscar-worthy turn for Emma Stone. Her on-screen transformation from a mewling child living in the body of an adult into the completely unfiltered, unashamed Bella, the belle of Paris, London, Lisbon and Alexandria is astounding. The men she meets, including the wonderful, crazed casting of Mark Ruffalo as her main suitor, Doug Wedderburn, are completely undone by her. Wedderburn begins as a slick con-man, and ends discarded and dejected.

And she cares not a whit. She is completely self-indulgent, but without pretense. And that's why you'll love her and forgive her. Whatever she does, whether it's dancing, drinking or 'furious jumping', she gives it her all. Once she leaves the Baxter home to go on adventures, she continuously creates and recreates herself.

The Baxter home is filled with animals concocted in what can only be described as a Frankensteinian fever-dream. They are 'created' by someone who, himself, resembles a grotesque.

Dafoe's face is puzzle. That is to say, he's does not look 'puzzled' but his face resembles a puzzle whose pieces have been forced together, the edges all askew. He belches noxious gas bubbles that actually float. Duckdogs, chickendogs, pigdogs, the gardens are filled with beautiful flowers and a cacophony of truly monstrous creatures. Discord reigns within the walls of the Baxter home.

To earn his living, Dr. Baxter is, in fact, an eminent scientific anatomist in London, giving lectures to students of the bodily sciences. In his scientific life at home, Dr. Baxter has also pushed the boundaries of what is known, which, according

to him, is the only way to live. The rooms in the house appear to have padded walls, suggesting mental psychosis. Much of the beginning of the film is shot through a fish-eye lens, further unbalancing the audience.

Even as a child, Belle is unabashedly sexual, living only for the pleasure of the senses, and that does not change as she matures. You will gasp at the discomfort which others are forced to endure. And cheer when Belle strips away their pretentious way of living.

The visuals of Poor Things are a Terry Gilliam film on steroids, with giant colorful blimps, though Gilliam had nothing to do with this film, except as Director Yorgos Lanthimos' obvious homage to Gilliam's work.

So what happened to Bella that placed her in the hands of Dr. Baxter? Is she the unwilling victim of a post-modern Prometheus or does she grow to surpass his greatest dream? Go find out for yourself. You'll either love it or hate it. But pity Bella not a bit. She is 100% her own woman, at time when women struggled to find their voice, their place in society. Which, on reflection, hasn't actually changed enough in 150 years.

Poor Things is one of the most original, outstanding screenplays of 2023.

https://www.infocus-magazine.com/news/760/Poor-Things.html

08/12/2023

RIP Ryan O'Neal

23/11/2023

Movie Review: Maestro

One of the most astonishing things about Maestro is the seamless way Bradley Cooper has transitioned into Leonard Bernstein. The mannerisms, the intonations, the style, the prosthetics, the hair on his head …. anyone personally familiar with the great composer/conductor would be hard pressed to tell one from the other across a crowded room. An amazing achievement, especially since Cooper was also the Director on this film.

Maestro is a sweeping overview of Bernstein's creative genius, while simultaneously examining the intricate and sometimes sad details of his search for satisfaction in his personal life. His wife, Felicia Montealegre Bernstein (Carey Mulligan), was a Costa Rican-Chilean actress when they met at a star-studded party. They were instantly taken with each other, finishing each others sentences and feeding off their incandescent energy.

It was this same energy that made everyone in Bernsteins circle flock to him like moths to a flame. And Bernstein sucked it all in, leaving everyone, including his wife, exhausted by the stress of being around his double life.

He took few pains to hide from his wife his desire for the adoration of male lovers. She tries to accept his bisexuality, but you can see the pain it causes her, each and every time. When the gossip starts to become common knowledge, his lifestyle begins to affect their family, especially confusing his oldest daughter, whose world revolves around her father. Felicia begs him to not tell her the truth.

The scene in which he must outright lie to his daughter by not revealing his truth is disturbing and painful. In fact, it may be one of the few scenes in the movie where Bernstein comes to the revelation that by living two lives, he is hurting everyone around him. Even though everyone in his life agrees that Bernstein is "many things at once", he is aware that his child is hurting because of his choices.

We meet some of his long and short-term male lovers, though Bernstein had many more than the movie alludes to. Yet it must be said that his tumultuous lust for living most certainly contributed in a major way to his passionate, compelling music. You cannot separate the two. Bernstein himself stated, "A work of art does not answer questions, it provokes them; and its essential meaning is the tension between the contradictory answers." The tension between notes in an orchestral piece, the tension between himself and his wife, all come to life on the screen.

We follow Bernstein on his journey from Carneigie Hall, where he got his big break in 1943, standing in on short notice for a Royal Philharmonic live-broadcast concert. The grin on his face when his name is announced to the seated attendees is positively radiant. With no rehearsal, he was magnificient and received a standing ovation when the final note sounded.

Famous musical artists of the day are both namedropped and appear as featured players in the film: Jerome 'Jerry' Robbins, 'Stevie' Sondheim. Betty Comden and Adolph Green were giving an impromptu performance at the party where Leonard and Felicia met, and so on. We're treated to a jazz-balletic dance scene from "On The Town", where Bernsteins unabashed bisexuality becomes readily apparent to his wife.

At times manic in his need to compose the perfect series of notes, Bernstein does credit his success to three things: luck, talent and determination. But there's also another element, and that is the pure magic of the Leonard-Felicia bond. When together, they are at times quite miserable, but the couple are even more bereft of joy when they are separated.

As Bernstein's sister Shirley (Sarah Silverman) alludes, Felicia knew exactly who he is and why she stays with him. Silverman herself is wonderful in her role; she's the same snappy, sarcastic, smart comedianne we all know and adore. And she is absolutely devoted to her brother.

The severest critique I have of the film is the far-too extended performance in the church. Unless you're a devotee of all things Bernstein, and I mean ALL things Bernstein, this really dragged down what is otherwise an amazing, engaging film.

https://www.infocus-magazine.com/news/758/Maestro.html

19/11/2023

Movie Review : Next Goal Wins

Sometimes an 'underdog' film is too sweet and sugary for its own good. Next Goal Wins is not that type of film. Directed by Academy Award Winner Taika Waititi and starring Michael Fassbender, if this film's only goal is to make you smile without cringing, I can guarantee success.

In the film, 'inspired by true events', Fassbender takes on the role of Thomas Rongen, FIFA's worst-tempered soccer coach, drafted to lead American Samoa, the league's worst soccer team. In 2001, that team suffered the most-cringeworthy defeat in soccer history, losing 31-0. This film is set 10 years after that loss. The current team is just as bad, and maybe a little worse: they have still never scored a single goal. Following their humiliating loss, many of the team's best players including the self-blaming goalie, have abandoned the sport.

Videotape of Rongen acting up, rage-throwing furniture around soccer fields, has prompted a FIFA board meeting in his behalf. How do you solve a problem like Rongen? Following a funny schtick bit with Elisabeth Kubler-Ross's theory of the five stages of grief, and yes, even that is humorous, Rongen is shipped off to American Samoa. It's his last, and only chance, of remaining part of the league's staff.

Everyone on the island has two jobs, which sometimes interferes with soccer practice. Everyone attends church, which definitely interferes with soccer practice. It's readily apparent that soccer is a priority to the team, but not enough of a priority to get them to practice on time. 'Don't worry, be happy' could certainly be the theme song of the island.

The always dour Rongen is definitely a fish out of water here. Nobody gets his coaching style. He doesn't understand why they don't take the game seriously. Especially when there's a championship at stake.

And that's the set-up for this laugh-out-loud film with a lot of heart. I don't want to give too much away but Kaimana's supporting role as Jaiyah, one of the team's players, emerges as the perfect sunny counter-point to Rongen's constant toxicity.

Since this is an underdog story, I'm sure everyone expects that, in the final moments, the coach will come to appreciate all that the team has to offer. I can promise that Next Goal Wins offers up all that, and a whole lot more. The screenplay, written by Waititi and Iain Morris, offers up something positively delectable. You won't be disappointed because they kick that script straight into the cinematic end zone for a GOOOOAAALLLL!

https://www.infocus-magazine.com/news/759/Next-Goal-Wins.html

08/11/2023

Movie Review: Rustin

Rustin is a new biopic about an important American whose name may not ring a bell, though it was Bayard Rustin, and not Dr. King, who organized 1963's monumental, history-making March on Washington.

In 1954, SCOTUS ruled segregation was unconstitutional, finally exploding the national powder-keg whose fuse had been lit for at least a decade previous. Rustin opens with a series of quick, iconic stills from the 1960’s, photos depicting the racial brutality burned onto our social consciousness. The 1960 Greensboro, Alabama lunch counter sit-in. Six-year-old Ruby Bridges entering the William Franz elementary school in 1960 New Orleans, surrounded by security guards. The “scream image” of white students from the Little Rock Nine High School integration melee.

Rustin is historical in its origins and yet, so contemporary in its themes. "Counting on the courts to eradicate racial inequality, that's madness”. This line is found in the film, but that truth is currently being debated today in far too many states who choose to prefer division over equality. Not only is the concept of racial equality being re-challenged in 2023, but gender and sexual equality are as well.

The film is a history lesson on the tangled web and struggle for power in the 60's between groups such as the NAACP, CORE, SNCC and SCLS, and the egos within each movement. Director George C. Wolfe quickly establishes the working relationships and conflicts among all the parties involved.

Executive Produced by Barack and Michele Obama, Rustin begins at a frenetic pace, underscored by the sound of jazz music. Bayard Rustin (Coleman Domingo), close friends with Dr. King (Aml Ameen), has been under FBI surveillance since at least 1955 because of his participation in the Montgomery bus boycott. Rustin is so much a part of Dr. King’s family that King's children are always asking their dad when “Uncle” Bayard is coming to visit.

Individuals who contributed to the cause are brought to life, such as A. Philip Randolph (Glynn Turman), a labor leader, who helped end segregation in the armed forces. He’s the founder of the first major Black labor union and one of his scenes shows a photo of Frederick Douglass displayed in his office. Bayard Ruskin reports to Randolph.

Randolph is not a fan of the style of NY's Representative Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. (Jeffrey Wright). Powell passed legislation that made lynching a federal crime, as well as bills that desegregated public schools. Yet Powell, a close friend to Jack Kennedy, does not fully embrace King’s philosophy of nonviolence.

Roy Wilkins (Chris Rock) helmed the NAACP beginning in 1955. Wilkins collaborated with Dr. King on many civil rights campaigns and pushed for communication and alliances between factions, rather than pushing the flashier 'in-your-face' style favored by Rustin. Medgar Evers (Rashad Demond Edwards), also of the NAACP, and a very young John Lewis (Maxwell Whittington-Cooper) both play their parts in this historical drama. Though his on-screen time is short, it's apparent that even as a young man, John Lewis spoke with both power and compassion; early in his political career, he believed in causing 'Good Trouble' and admired Rustin.

As a gay man, Rustin is always cognizant of the extra level of prejudice he personally faces, as these rising members of the black community fight to control and achieve racial equality. He hopes that his personal life will be ignored, knowing that any one of these powerful men might use his sexuality as a weapon against him, should he try to assume control of the direction of the movement. As we see throughout the film, though he attempts to shrug off the betrayals, his worst fears always come to pass.

“The world will know the truth about MLK and his Queen, and I don't mean Loretta”, states Congressman Powell. Though their end goals may be identical, there is no love lost between the men. After a personally disastrous 1963 roundtable attended by Dr. King, the NAACP representatives et al, Rustin is ousted from the group. He joins the War Resisters League for a short time, eventually leaving that institution as well, because they were not vocal enough for him. He believed the fight for equality was growing stagnant, that those in power, including the White House, were not doing enough to push the boundaries and close the racial inequalities. Soon after leaving the Resisters, leading a growing team of young idealists, the concept for the D.C. March began to take shape.

Rustin believed that a D.C. March would best be represented by a two-day event, with perhaps 100,000 attendees. With assistance from the Parks Service, people would sleep in tents surrounding the Lincoln Memorial. We all know that idea fell by the wayside. However, historical photos tell us that the final tally was more than twice what Rustin envisioned. 250,000 people from every corner of America arrived by plane, bus, train and car, surrounding the Reflecting Pool and bearing witness to Dr. King's epic speech.

Benefits at The Apollo theater, as well as in Los Angeles, raised a great deal of the seed money for buses to transport participants; boots on the ground in white liberal suburbs were also integral to the mission's success. Based on the number of power plays going on between interested parties up to the day of the event, it's amazing that the March actually came to fruition.

In case you’re wondering, yes, there are women who play a role in the movement, as well as the film. But as Dr. Anna Hegeman (CCH Pounder) puts it, their contributions, more often than not, are ignored by the men at the head of each organization.

With music by Lenny Kravitz, Rustin is a compelling look back on a turbulent time, with a gutsy performance by Colman Domingo. Knowing he might very well be forced to sacrifice his personal life on the altar of the greater good, Rustin still forges ahead in his quest for racial equality.

In 2013, Rustin received a posthumous Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Obama.

https://www.infocus-magazine.com/news/757/Rustin.html

03/11/2023

Five Nights At Freddy's

Let me preface this review by saying this reviewer is definitely NOT the target audience for this film. I have never played the video game on which it is based. I'm also not a huge horror fan, since, in my opinion, the majority of them are repetitive, low low budget and based on gore rather than story line.

But I walked into this film knowing it was a Blumhouse production, which usually bodes well for me. They produced M3GAN, The Black Phone and The Invisible Man. All of which I enjoyed.

Legends about missing children combined with killer Chuck E. Cheese knockoff animatronics? Sure, why not. I loved The Rock-afire Explosion documentary about Showbiz Pizza Place that was released in 2008, where the Cheese animatronics originated. That film was a tasty bit of nostalgia, even though I never visited a Showbiz as a child. The release for Five Nights even listed Freddy's animatronics as being created by Jim Henson's Creature Shop.

And hey, the producers cast some recognizable talent: Mary Stuart Masterson and Matthew Lillard.

So what could possibly go wrong? At the 1:20 mark, yes, I even checked my watch, Freddy's blew any semblance of rationality. Now, maybe I DID need to have played the videogame to max out my enjoyment of the film. There were certainly audience members who had their socks knocked off by, of all things, a cabdriver and a giant doll with a killer ribcage. But I can tell you, I wish I had invited a guest, just so I could confirm that little made any sense till the closing credits. And the things that did make sense were so predictable, it became tedious.

Mike (Josh Hutcherson) has custody of his 10-year-old sister, Abby (Piper Rubio). Mike has failed at not only every job he's managed to get, but also in dealing with the kidnapping of his younger brother, Garrett, when they were both just children. It was Mike's responsibility to watch Garrett, and he blew it, big-time. Abby never met the missing brother, but even making that small point in the film felt really difficult to follow. Mike has continual nightmares about the day his sibling vanished.

Mike takes the only job that's left to be offered to him, a nighttime security guard at an abandoned theme restaurant, “Freddy Fazbear's Pizza”. He's too financially strapped to say no because Mike's Aunt Jane (Masterson) is doing everything she can to get Abby into her clutches for the money that will come with being her guardian.

In the meantime, Abby has been crayoning pictures of bizarre family groupings that are pinned to the wall of her bedroom. It's fairly easy to see the resemblance between her drawings and Mike's nightmares. But no, Mike never catches on till it's too late. Why is that? Oh, right, because if he did, the movie would have actually been more interesting.

When Mike starts his job on night one, we're presented with four animatronics: Freddy, Foxy, Bonnie and Chica. They certainly aren't the friendly crew from Showbiz. There's definitely something off kilter with this quartet. One night Mike brings Abby to work with him, falls asleep, and then finds her consorting with the gang of four. Mike is horrified, but not enough to call someone, anyone, even maybe some Ghostbusters? Yeah, maybe he shouldn't have custody of his sister.

Masterson shows her true colors, all of them black, in every one of her scenes. This family is in need of serious therapy. Abby hates her Aunt because she's mean. But she's cool with killer 8' tall duckies who talk inside her head? Mmmm okay, if you say so. I asked some of the true fans, and you could easily tell who they were, if I was being too picky in my criticism. Perhaps I was judging the film too harshly. No, apparently I was on target. They also felt that Five Nights at Freddy's was four nights too long. Can you survive even one night at Freddy's? Who knows, but I don't recommend trying to.

https://www.infocus-magazine.com/news/756/Five-Nights-At-Freddys.html