Sleepwalker (2026) by Brandon Auman

Director: Brandon Auman

Year: 2026

Country: USA

Alternate Titles: N/A

Genre: Supernatural

Plot:

Trying to raise her family, a woman hoping to keep her family together after a series of personal setbacks and hardships finds that her daughter has started violently sleepwalking while she stays with her, eventually finding the supernatural reason for everything and sets out to save her family.

Review:

Overall, this was a decent enough, if somewhat disappointing, genre effort. The main factor going for this one is the generally intriguing atmosphere on display that focuses on the connection between the family strife and the different supernatural entities throughout here. With the first half spending as much time going in-depth towards the series of struggles she faces, from the struggles about raising her daughter who’s sleepwalking due to the stress of her parents’ strained relationship as they’re going through a divorce at the same time he’s struggling to regain consciousness after a terrible accident, this one sets up the kind of struggle where she seems quite sympathetic with everything she’s going through. The undercurrent of supernatural activity during the course of all this, thinking that the sleepwalking of her daughter and her as well, helps to make for a more unnerving and draining experience as everything tends to bring her down emotionally and physically.

While that usually sets up some intriguing moments in the later half when the exploration of what’s going on starts to take a more over-the-top supernatural bent, it still takes a while to get there. The obvious nature of what’s happening, from the dream warnings and visions of the ghostly figures hanging around the family and targeting the son specifically, but the tempo at which it all plays out is way too draining to make much of what’s going on. The constant discussions and dialogue about the past relationship and how he got into the treatment he has, namely involving the flashbacks to their relationship together fighting and verbally abusing each other that lead to their marital woes in the first place, set the story up but yet do nothing all that interesting since these take the supernatural antics out of the film. With so little impact in the film and no real focus at all, even during the final stretch where it starts to become a bit more terrifying, these still feel underdeveloped and barely there, bringing this down in the end.

Overview: **.5/5

A watchable if generally disappointing genre effort, there’s enough here to not be a total waste, but there are some big issues here that keep this one down from what it could’ve been. Those with an interest in the subject matter or who are fine with the issues on display will have the most to enjoy here, while most others out there should heed extreme caution.