While that casting may sound like a distant-second choice, it’s just about the best thing “Slumberland” has going for it. It’s a flamboyantly clownish role of the kind that typically goes to Johnny Depp, but which instead falls to Jason Momoa. The first night in her new home, Nemo’s bed sprouts long spider-like legs, crawls out the window and carries her all the way back to the lighthouse, where she meets Flip, a self-proclaimed “outlaw” thief in a pink suit and feathered top hat. As Nemo’s new guardian, he sends her to school and struggles to relate, leaving Nemo to her dreams, which have become excitingly vivid since her father’s passing. The accident occurs off-screen and is barely dealt with before Nemo’s packed up to live with her awkward uncle (Chris O’Dowd) in the big city, which she doesn’t like one bit. Here’s the pitch: Only child Nemo (in a nifty twist, that’s a girl’s name in this imagining) was raised in a lighthouse by her dad, who tells her a vivid bedtime story before disappearing abruptly after the first scene. “Slumberland” feels less like an adaptation of “Little Nemo” than another big, unwieldy modern visual effects movie loosely “inspired by” an earlier piece of name-brand IP (à la Ben Stiller’s “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty,” which it rather unfortunately resembles).
But that’s about as far as the similarities go - which might explain why Netflix hasn’t bothered to underline the connection in its marketing campaign. Yes, the main character is named Nemo, and yes, most of the film takes place in the fantastical subconscious realm of Slumberland, where gravity and time play by altogether unpredictable rules. Live-action “Dream One” came closest.) And not that “Constantine” director Francis Lawrence’s ugly and all-around off-putting kiddie movie counts - or even has much of anything to do with McCay’s ultra-imaginative turn-of-the-20th-century comic strip. (At one point, Hayao Miyazaki tried to get an animated version made. Not that people haven’t attempted it over the years. Somewhere between “Alice in Wonderland” and “The Little Prince” in style and sensibility, Winsor McCay’s weekly funny-pages serial “Little Nemo in Slumberland” more than deserves a proper big-screen adaptation.
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