THE STORY – A girl named Stevie and her brother named Elliot magically travel into the world of dreams to find The Sandman, who would grant their wish of saving their parents’ marriage.
THE CAST – Jolie Hoang-Rappaport, Elias Janssen, Craig Robinson, Simu Liu, Cristin Milioti & Omid Djalili
THE TEAM – Alex Woo & Erik Benson (Directors/Writers)
THE RUNNING TIME – 91 Minutes
Whether your childhood was difficult, wonderful, or somewhere in between, everyone can relate to the idea of a mental escape, imagining a life that resembles our dreams. Many of us once drifted into fantasy worlds, whether through imaginary friends or beloved stories, to make sense of feelings too big for the real world to comprehend. The gap between what we imagine for ourselves and what we actually experience can feel enormous, especially as children, and reconciling those two worlds is never easy. With that in mind, “In Your Dreams” follows two siblings who set out to repair their fractured family by turning their dreams into reality. The result is a wild, funny, and heartfelt adventure brimming with creativity, silliness, and genuine emotion.
Young Stevie (voiced by Jolie Hoang-Rappaport) has started to notice cracks in her parents’ marriage. She knows something is wrong and is determined to fix it, no matter what it takes. From the very start, it’s clear that “In Your Dreams” isn’t afraid to confront difficult truths about family life. Director and writer Alex Woo, along with co-director and co-writer Erik Benson, avoid dancing around the subject or hiding it behind euphemisms. Stevie openly worries that her parents might separate, and that frankness feels refreshing in a film aimed squarely at children. Kids are far more resilient than we often give them credit for, and Woo and Benson understand that clarity can be far more comforting than confusion.
As Stevie wrestles with how to bring her parents back together, her younger brother Elliot (Elias Janssen) finds an old book about the legend of the Sandman. Before long, the two are swept into a shared dream world that is equal parts wondrous and weird. Their first stop is Breakfast Town, a medieval city inhabited entirely by talking breakfast foods. There’s a benevolent Toast King sprinkling sugar over his subjects, a frazzled egg mom pushing a carton of egg children, and even a breakfast band providing a soundtrack. Along the way, they reunite with Elliot’s beloved stuffed toy, Baloney Tony (Craig Robinson), a hilariously smelly creature of indeterminate species. Stevie, however, has one goal: to find the Sandman (Omid Djalili) and make her dream of fixing her parents’ marriage come true.
To reach him, the siblings must stay asleep even as their dreams start to turn into nightmares. Woo walks a fine line between keeping things accessible for young audiences and delivering just the right amount of eeriness. In one sequence, after Stevie dreams her teeth fall out, Breakfast Town decays into a moldy, menacing wasteland. While the animation from Woo’s Kuku Studios for Netflix can look a bit plain at times, the nightmare imagery bursts with creativity and energy, exploring the far edges of what’s appropriate for children while still feeling safe. The character animation can be slightly rubbery, but the film makes up for it with visual inventiveness, especially during a stunning anime-inspired sequence that stands out as one of the film’s highlights.
At its core, though, “In Your Dreams” succeeds because of its emotional sincerity. Woo’s years as a Pixar story artist clearly left their mark, as the story always circles back to the heart of Stevie’s longing and love for her family. The film indeed borrows from familiar DNA, with a bit of “Toy Story” and a lot of “Inside Out,” but those influences work because they serve timeless ideas about growing up, loss, and love. Simu Liu and Cristin Milioti bring surprising depth to Stevie and Elliot’s parents, their believable tension grounding the film’s flights of fancy in real emotion. Their estrangement is handled with care, neither too heavy for children nor too sugar-coated. Most touching of all is the evolving bond between Stevie and Elliot. They bicker and tease like real siblings, but when it matters, they stand by each other, a dynamic rarely portrayed with this much warmth and truth in family films.
“In Your Dreams” doesn’t reinvent the animated adventure, nor does it need to. It’s a whimsical, sometimes chaotic journey that effortlessly balances humor, imagination, and heartfelt emotion. Beneath the absurd dreamscapes and the eerie nightmares lies an emotional truth that resonates deeply: life may not always be what you dreamed it would be, but sometimes the real world turns out even better.
