Five Nights at Freddy’s fans will know that a movie adaptation of the hit horror video game franchise has been in the works for years – in fact, Warner Bros. got the ball rolling in 2015, just a year after the first game came out. After WB’s version fell through, though, Blumhouse acquired the IP in 2017. Unfortunately, they haven’t been any more successful in getting it off the ground, despite Chris Columbus (Gremlins) being attached to pen the script.
It’s been revealed, however, that Columbus has left the project after FNaF creator Scott Cawthon disagreed with his screenplay, meaning Blumhouse is back to square one. That’s disappointing for fans, obviously, but the good news is producer Jason Blum is maintaining that the studio is not giving up on its planned Five Nights movie and is dedicated to finding a way to making it work.
Blum dropped the bombshell that Columbus had exited the picture while speaking with Collider. He reiterated that various scripts have been written in the hopes of finding one Cawthon approves of, though they’ve yet to manage it.
“We’ve written multiple scripts, and we’ve got where we’re threading a needle, which is doing justice to Five Nights at Freddy’s and making Scott happy,” Blum said. “I don’t want to do something that Scott doesn’t like. Let me say that a different way. I don’t have the right to do anything Scott doesn’t like. Basically, Scott has kind of like the equivalent of ‘final cut’ and it’s taken longer than I hoped to get the right story.”
The producer then stressed that the project is definitely not being put in mothballs.
“We’re a long way from giving up,” he promised. “And I’m confident eventually I will figure it out.“
The current shape of the movie is in sharp contrast to the last update we received in 2020. Back then, Cawthon indicated that he was happy with the shape of the screenplay and filming was raring to go in spring 2021. Clearly, though, some creative differences reared their head after this update and things must’ve ground to a halt. We won’t be getting this one for a while, then, but at least Blum is dedicated to figuring out a version that makes both producers and Cawthon happy.
In the meantime, Five Nights at Freddy’s: Security Breach, the tenth installment in the video game saga, is supposed to be hitting PlayStation 5, PS4 and PC sometime later this year.
