Five Nights at Freddy’s movie director Chris Columbus drops out of project

The app game Five Nights at Freddy’s was released seven years ago, and that’s just about how long a cinematic adaptation of the game has been stuck in development hell. Last year, it looked like the film would finally go into production this past spring with director Chris Columbus (writer of Gremlins, director of Home Alone, etc.) at the helm… but that didn’t happen, and now producer Jason Blum has revealed that Columbus is “no longer attached” to the project.

But Blum also assured the folks at Collider that they’re “a long way from giving up” on the idea of bringing Five Nights at Freddy’s to the screen.

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 (game creator Scott Cawthon) happy. … 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.”

In case you’re not familiar with Five Nights at Freddy’s, the game centers on 

a security guard battling animatronic robots that come to life in a Chuck E. Cheese-like venue.

Basically, it’s the same thing as the recent Nicolas Cage movie Willy’s Wonderland. Given that Willy’s Wonderland seemed to underwhelm a lot of viewers (you can read our own Chris Bumbray’s review HERE and The Iceman’s review HERE), maybe it’s for the best that they’re taking their time with Five Nights at Freddy’s.

Blum said a film version of Five Nights at Freddy’s is “really tough to crack”. To get an idea of just how tough it is, check out THIS POST in which we shared Cawthon’s thoughts on twelve different versions of the script that have been written over the years.