“It’s so beautiful,” was my 7-year-old daughter’s teary-eyed sentiment regarding the finale of Alexander Woo and co-director Erik Benson’s lovely animated feature In Your Dreams. I share the sentiment wholeheartedly. With shades and echoes of Pixar classics like Inside Out, the Netflix-produced film is similarly vibrant with color and emotions, similarly unafraid to delve into darkness and confront adult themes, similarly clever in how it juxtaposes those messages against pure silliness and slapstick. It even ends on a note of ambiguity that’s far from a neatly packaged “happily ever after.” And therein lies its appeal.
Although this marks his directorial debut, Woo isn’t exactly new to the world of animation, having worked on numerous beautiful shorts and as a storyboard artist on Pixar films like Ratatouille and Incredibles 2. Here he expertly utilizes his experience, effortlessly keeping the pacing swift (the running time is 90 minutes, including credits), blending different visual styles — including several brilliant anime interludes — with aplomb, and straying away from obvious “teachable lessons;” what I’ve previously referred to as “didactic finger-wagging.” Woo and Benson don’t underestimate their young audience’s intelligence, subtly layering in complexity, which comes off as a mini-miracle.
When Stevie (Jolie Hoang-Rappaport) feels her down-on-their-luck musician parents falling further and further apart, she does what a child can to keep the family together — like making mom and dad’s (Cristin Milioti and Simu Liu) favorite breakfast they no longer make. Out of options, magical book in hand, Stevie and her brother Elliot (Elias Janssen) delve into the surreal world of dreams in search of the fabled Sandman (Omid Djahili) to reunite their folks. On the way, they encounter characters both wild and wise, but the apotheosis has to be the rediscovery of Baloney Tony (Craig Robinson), Elliot’s old toy — a wacky, old, stinky giraffe with an attitude.
IN YOUR DREAMS – In Your Dreams is a comedy adventure about Stevie (12) and her little brother Elliot (8) who journey into the absurd landscape of their own dreams. If the siblings can withstand a snarky stuffed giraffe, zombie breakfast foods, and the queen of nightmares, the Sandman will grant them their ultimate dream come true… the perfect family. Cr: Netflix © 2025
“…Stevie and her brother Elliot delve into the surreal world of dreams in search of the fabled Sandman to reunite their folks.”
The voice cast does a stellar job. Liu and Milioti bring both gravitas and lightness to their hapless couple. Hoang-Rappaport captures the essence of a bright teen on the cusp of adolescence, her coming-of-age made all the more fragile by the instability at home. But it’s Robinson as Baloney Tony and Janssen as Elliot who run away with In Your Dreams, the former all wacky non-sequiturs, grossness, and unbridled warmth, the latter the perfect embodiment of a rascal that age.
The discovery of Baloney (stuck behind a fridge with an old, moldy what-I-assume-to-be cupcake who deems herself a princess). Stevie and Elliot’s first exhilarating flight on his horse-bed. Our heroes’ first visit to Dreamland, wherein pastries morph into zombies. A Wac-A-Mole trip down a river of lava. A berserk allusion to Five Nights at Freddy’s that brilliantly features a famous pop song from the past. The rise of Sandman’s castle… The list of highlights goes on, as there are really no redundant scenes. For all their liveliness, though, it’s the quieter moments — Stevie dealing with the possible separation of her parents, the family’s precarious socioeconomic reality — that resonate the most.
As a child of the 1980s, I appreciate the lack of sentimentality, the succinctness, and the heavy dose of reality in an otherwise fantastical story. But what do I know? I am not the intended audience. My daughter has gone to pretty much every screening of a child-appropriate feature this year. She claims In Your Dreams is by far the best. Who am I to argue with the true expert?
"…I appreciate the lack of sentimentality, the succinctness, and the heavy dose of reality in an otherwise fantastical story."
