The good news is that Netflix’s Slumberland is a lot of fun when it is good. The better news is that Netflix’s Slumberland is quite often very good.
Slumberland tells the story of Marlow Barkley’s Nemo, a precocious young girl who lives in a lighthouse with her father. After an unexpected tragedy destroys her idyllic life, she moves in with her estranged uncle in the outside world. One night, after she has fallen asleep, Nemo is whisked away back to her lighthouse where she meets Jason Momoa’s Flip, a character in her father’s bedtime stories, who tells her of a treasure map and the secrets of Slumberland.
Nemo and Flip team up and go on a wild adventure through Slumberland, jumping through people’s dreams, all while evading the Nightmare that is chasing them, and Agent Green, a dream cop on a mission to stop them.
The Waking World
Slumberland does all the right things right. The movie doesn’t waste any time in getting going. We move through the set up of Nemo’s relationship with her father and the tragedy that befalls them within the first 10 minutes. 16 minutes in and we’re already in Slumberland getting introduced to Flip. Slumberland then propels us, right along with Nemo and Flip, through a myriad of dreams. And it does so without ever coming off as being rushed.
Most of all, however, the thing that Slumberland gets absolutely right, is that it is genuinely wholesome and fun. This is a movie that gets the whole “fun-for-all-ages” thing down pat. Unlike, say, something like Jungle Cruise where the “fun” feels disingenuous and forced, like an A.I. knob producers turn in order to get a wider swath of audience in, Slumberland is a pure escapism, chock full of colours and imagery that are natural and organic to the story being told and the characters on screen.
Double-Knock
Speaking of which, Jason Momoa is perfect in this. Flip never feels like a put on or an exaggeration. It just feels like Momoa turned up to 11, unburdened by what little notice he might have of society’s expectations of a man of his age, size, and look. Flip is that meme of Jason Momoa about to jump Henry Cavill on the red carpet.
And then there is Marlow Barkley, who is an absolute revelation. As Nemo, she plays the reluctant foil to Flip. And as a young girl who’s had her whole world taken from her, she isn’t quite as easily distracted as he is. Nemo is focused. She is on a mission to try get back everything that she’s lost. She is the Felix to Momoa’s Oscar and their odd couple pairing and fantastic chemistry together make for delightful viewing.
Sea of Nightmares
The one nitpick I have against Slumberland is that it is a little too long. At 2 hours, it’s not so much that the movie drags, but that there’s just so much of it. That said, it isn’t one of those movies where it’s immediately obvious what you can lose in order to have it come in at 90 minutes. So much of it is good. It just felt incredibly dense for its target demographic.
Slumberland isn’t all butterflies and giant flying geese though. There is a real darkness and sense of threat that permeates through the entire story. The Nightmare, a massive shadowy cloud creature that chases Nemo and Flip is genuinely frightening and is beautifully designed to scare younger audiences without actually (hopefully) giving them real nightmares. And Flip’s backstory adds such an emotional weight that, when it was finally revealed, had me let out an audible gasp.
Slumberland is fun, beautiful, and funny, and it achieves all that without ever dumbing down its characters, or downplaying the stakes of its story. Don’t sleep on this one. (Ba dum tish!)
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