This was a real disappointment - the Sandman, an iconic figure in horror, ruined by a bad script and worse acting. The characters were undeveloped, and their lines, admittedly bad, were just made worse by bad acting, and the script fell flat trying to give the story a twist.
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kwq_e_50024 June 2018
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paulclaassen20 June 2018Uhm, firstly, why does the tagline say 'Don't fall asleep' if the story has nothing to do with falling asleep? The little girl can conjure the Sandman at any time at free will, and the Sandman also appears when she gets upset - like when Bruce Banner becomes The Hulk. This was ok-ish; there really wasn't anything special to write home about. The effects were fine and the monster was creepy-ish. Shae Smolik was very good as the little girl, that I admit. In fact, the acting in general was good. The killing does become a bit unnecessary and too much later in the film, similar to a Steven Seagall or John Woo film...
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paul_haakonsen30 December 2018Well, for starters I will just say that this was not all that bad for a SyFy Channel movie actually. But with that being said, then I must also say that this was no outstanding experience in the horror genre either.
The storyline in "The Sandman" is fairly simplistic. An 8 year old girl is capable of invoking a nightmarish creature known as the Sandman, a creature that kills without a second thought. She has been put into custody with her aunt, and they must find a way to rid the girl of the nightmarish entity before it becomes too late.
Yeah, well on the surface it seemed like a fairly okay plot idea. The execution on the screen, however, told a different tale. The movie was fairly slow paced with nothing overly exciting happening throughout the course of the movie. And that meant that the entire movie experience felt rather prolonged and at times dull. Despite running at a standard feature length, this movie felt way longer.
The design of the Sandman was perhaps the best part of the entire movie. I liked the way they made him look, however, I would think if they had made sand continuously fall from him from various places, it would have be the icing on the cake. The face of the Sandman was quite interesting.
For a horror movie, then there wasn't an abundance of special effects throughout the course of "The Sandman", which puzzled med, because this definitely seemed like a movie that would have benefitted so much from having lots of special effects. However, the special effects they did have in the movie did work out well enough, and certainly served their intended purpose.
The acting in the movie was adequate, although it was mostly unknown and unfamiliar actors and actresses to me. I do like that in a movie, so it was a nice thing I think. They had Tobin Bell in the movie and lining on the movie's cover/poster. Just a shame that he was hardly in the movie. But hey, it was the biggest name in the movie, so why not brandish him on the cover?
Was "The Sandman" a scary movie? Hardly so, despite it being branded as a horror movie.
"Then Sandman" is the type of movie that you watch once, and never return to watch a second time, because the movie simply doesn't have enough contents to the storyline to support more than a single viewing.
An average SyFy release at best. -
walk92950119 March 2018Woof. Bad writing, bad acting, bad effects... Just bad. And the annoying little girl wasn't trying to stop anything and didn't even act afraid. She just conjured up the Sandman to kill folks on a whim and looked like she enjoyed it. So unlikable. My sons and I did get entertainment value from making fun of it, but that's it.
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cgimmi27 March 2018Terrible graphics and even worse acting from the child. Predictable horror made for an awful movie.
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TheLittleSongbird7 June 2018'The Sandman' drew me into seeing it, with a cool poster/cover, an slightly intriguing premise and as someone with a general appreciation for horror. That it was low-budget, which from frequent personal experience is rarely a good sign due to that there are so many poor ones out there, made me though apprehensive.
It is sadly however yet another film seen recently, hence some reiteration because the exact same strengths and flaws those films have are present here, that to me was incredibly disappointing considering its potential which it doesn't do anywhere near enough with. 'The Sandman' is terrible, with a plethora of problems (huge ones too) and doesn't do enough with its potential, which was hardly small. There is next to nothing to recommend and it is a sleeper.
Lets start with the positives. The scenery is atmospheric and spooky. Tobin Bell does his best.
Unfortunately, the scenery is not done justice by the rather direct to video schlocky way it's shot and edited, it was very clear that the film was made in a rush with no care or enthusiasm.
Going on further to the negatives, the story does feel paper thin, disjointed and over-stretched and some of it feels vague, under-explained in the last third where the film especially became duller, more predictable, more senseless and less scary. Too many characters are too sketchy and with nowhere near enough to make one want to endear to them. Their annoying and illogical decision making and behaviours frustrates.
Making the film feel bland and forgettable with not enough heart put into it. The effects are ropy at best, the sound quality is obvious and utilised cheaply (being too loud in the build ups and people's reactions) and it's best not mentioning the uniformly lumbering and histrionic acting, especially one of the worst child performances ever.
Dialogue can be stilted and rambling, with lots of clichés and no depth whatsoever, while the pace goes to a standstill very quickly and drags on forever with very little going on worth caring about, never recovering. Found too many the supposedly shocking moments not surprising or scary and the supposedly creepy atmosphere dreary, due to the excessive obviousness, a lot of dumb and vague moments and explanations and the lack of tension and suspense. Would not have minded the lack of originality (the film is extremely derivative and in a dumbed and watered down way) if the story and atmosphere were at least alright in execution, in reality they were both very poorly done.
A lot of 'The Sandman' has underdeveloped plot elements and often nonsensical and confusing character motivations, while too many of the things to make you jump or shocked are far from creative or scary and are pretty tame. The ending makes the film finish on an incomplete and confused whimper.
There is not enough threat, and what there is of it tends to be used poorly, it is completely unimaginative and more odd than creepy in its execution of the more psychological elements, completely failing to show any sense of horror or creativity. Some badly sagging momentum too. The direction is leaden, inexperience seems to be all over the film, and the music doesn't really fit.
Altogether, another very bad film. 2/10 Bethany Cox -
There is so much to say about The Sandman, unfortunately it's nothing good, but then absolutely nothing good at all. Almost all ingredients to make a bad movie are present, bad actors, a bad script, bad editing, bad CGI's, just everything. From the beginning you immediately know this movie has been made for television, it just oozes amateurism, but it's still watchable. the more you get to the end the more ridiculous and bad it becomes, you just start commenting on everything bad that is happening, in other words you never shut up during the entire last half hour. The main actresses, Haylie Duff and Shae Smolik, are just horrible. Haylie Duff is even bad when she just have to make a facial expression without saying anything. There are some good kids as actors but Shae Smolik isn't one of them, on the contrary she's the opposite. I would suggest those two give up on their acting career, they're still hiring at McDonalds. The scenario wasn't great from the beginning but with the extreme bad CGI's and bad acting this movie just becomes more laughable than anything else. And yes I keep in mind this is a television production, so I don't have to have too high hopes, but I've seen good tv movies before and The Sandman isn't one of them.
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jordankeckeisen30 June 2019I made an account just for the purpose to tell everyone how much this sucked. big waste of time :)
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mangoamante30 October 2020With some exceptions, the acting isn't great. The storyline and script are not strong, nor is the creature. The creature as a concept by itself has potential. This wasn't much of a horror movie. But with all that said, I've seen Much worse. I liked it ok.
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WiseMan2624 August 2019This is far the most terrible terible acting by a child. That little girl doesnt know how to acting, soo cringey. Apart from that, thsi movie also got a limited budget, i think. If they have budget, this movie could do better. And the monsters will be great if it used a high sfx, but god this movie could perform well if air on SYFY channel. Not gonna watch it anymore.
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EVERYONE is a critic. I don't go to movies to pick them apart. I rate the movie based on the entertainment value of it.
This movie was great "lite" fare. Just the right amount of gore and the Sandman was a perfect mummy-like monster.
This is worth a look. I would see it again to pick up things I missed the first time.
thebat2O -
Platypuschow29 December 2017The Scyfy channel don't do horror originals very often, and that's a shame because more often than not when they do they're quite good.
The Sandman is somewhat similiar to Before I Wake (2016). It tells the story of a girl with telekinetic powers who has somehow brought The Sandman into reality who kills anyone that threatens her.
Starring Haylie Duff (Who is far better than I expected), Tobin "Jigsaw" Bell and Paul Logan (Though he may as well not have been cast) this horror effort once again shows that Scyfy should should do more horror.
With a great looking beastie, decent performances and a well delivered concept this was a lot of fun. It's ending is a tad sudden and it's not overwhelmingly original but it's forgiven due to it's decent entertainment value.
The Good:
Sandman looks and sounds great
Tobin Bell
The Bad:
Very sudden ending
One very bad cgi scene
Couple of bits were never explained
Things I Learnt From This Movie:
Instead of renewing their access to shows like Xena & Wonderwoman the Scyfy channel should use that money to make more horror originals
I want a Sandman bodyguard! -
Very unimaginative, routine, seen-it-a-hundred times sort of horror movie. I got through about 50 minutes, and I couldn't continue. I would think that in 2017, filmmakers can come up with something a bit more novel.
How many b-horror movies use a little white girl, that screams a lot, named Madison, with a 20 something big sister/aunt, both are frightened of some cheap CBI monster, that kills people...
I'll pass. -
docdra4 June 2019Then this movie might be for you.
This is one of those movies that is a fairly typical representation of what horror movies have devolved into - honestly, there appear to be more movies released in this genre than any other every year, but the majority are always rated as mediocre at best.
Typical unrealistic behavior from the characters, mediocre writing, cheap jumpscares that aren't actually scary but are very predictable, and just bad writing and acting.
I won't give any major spoilers, but let's just review the aunt's behavior in one scene. She comes home with the child, hears police across the street and with no reason why, she storms across the street, shoves her neighbors out of the way violently and rudely. She then gets confrontational with the cops all in order to just ask what happened, and then starts violently yelling at another cop because she remembers seeing him somewhere else. This behavior is borderline psychotic in the context within the movie and completely unrealistic in any way, but this isn't even the worst example of poor writing this has to offer - the child's acting is a lot worse.
This felt like a movie with a B budget, but then everything else was a solid C- at best. Sure, there are some positive reviews for it, but I suspect that those are from people that simply don't really pay attention to detail when watching movies - you know, they like to disengage the brain as if that is supposed to excuse sloppy movie making. If I have to pretend to be a moron to enjoy it, then guess what... -
amyrodriguez-2339423 October 2017Being someone that has read the entire sandman series, this movie is absolute garbage! It is so terribly inaccurate in the portrayal of the sandman. This movie shouldn't have even been allowed to use that title. The producer of this movie should probably read the series before deciding they'd like to make a movie supposedly based upon it. And why does Haylie Duff have the sigil of death on her wrist? Non of it makes any sense, what so ever. I cant.
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edwarddjuan1 September 2020Yeah ofcourse, some or few of these characters were taken from the comic series "The Sandman" A.K.A The best DC Vertigo's comic series or one of the best if not the best.
So they made the little girl(kinda inspired by Unity Kinkaid) a modern reader here... They mentioned boogeyman(which was also mentioned in the comic series) and made the sandman a lame mummy.
Predictable and cheesy. Looks like modern horror movies are getting terrible -
dpraptor3 February 2019The movie has a crew of decent actors, but the whole Sandman creature was very lamely done, which really wrecked the movie. Also, throwing in superpowers was just getting silly. I give the 4 stars to the actors who really did a decent job in making a lifeless script come to some sort of life, but the really poor direction & shooting of the film, along with the silly sandman creature could not lift this attempt off the ground very far.
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CatWhisperer_sh122 October 2020Well there goes an hour and a half of my I'll never get back. Terrible acting from all characters, horrible story flow, ridiculous dialogue, laughable "special effects", etc... Definitely don't waste a minute of your life watching this!!!
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Wuchakk15 October 2017RELEASED TO TV IN 2017 and written & directed by Peter Sullivan, "The Sandman" chronicles events in the Los Angeles area when an orphaned girl with psychic abilities (Shae Smolik) is granted custody by her photographer aunt (Haylie Duff), who has a sometimes live-in partner (Shaun Sipos). Unfortunately, there's a deadly creature linked to the girl whom she calls the Sandman. Tobin Bell plays a government agent obsessed with cultivating the girl's powers while Amanda Wyss plays a psychiatrist who wants to heal her.
The theme has been around since "Forbidden Planet" (1956). The effective monster looks like a dried-up skeletal version of Swamp Thing mixed with the aliens from "Signs" (2002). Haylie is a winsome protagonist with a striking face and Tobin Bell is always good for these kinds of flicks. You'll remember Wyss from the first act of 1984's "A Nightmare on Elm Street." There's a haunting X-Files tone. I like the movie, but it's not the most compelling creature feature. There are some semi-tedious stretches, as with The X-Files.
THE MOVIE RUNS 90 minutes and was shot in Los Angeles, Acton & Hawthorne, California. ADDITIONAL CAST: Lyn Alicia Henderson appears as a staunch children services agent while Paul Logan is on hand as one of Bell's heavies.
GRADE: B-/C+ (5.5/10) -
Gunnar_R_Ingibjargarson9 February 2019A young girl stuck who have some kind of special power, starts to see figure, called the Sandman.
What can you say, ''what can get wrong' you got the SyFy making horror film. It's a awful mess. -
Louise_Aspinall19 October 2017I'll be honest, I'm dying to binge season two of "Stranger Things" and I decided to watch this because the preview looked similar.
"The Sandman" tells the story of a young girl (the amazing Shae Smolik) who goes to live with her aunt (Haylie Duff) when her father dies. Little does her aunt know that the girl has an ability to, as she puts it, "make things happen." One of these things is that she manifests the vicious Sandman whenever she is threatened. It's not long before the body count starts climbing and the aunt wonders who or what it is exactly that she's brought into her home.
Much like "Stranger Things," this movie is a genre stew made up of a variety of influences, from Stephen King to Steven Spielberg to James Cameron, and even "Stranger Things" itself. It's impossible to look at the little girl and not think of Eleven, who also had a psychic connection to a nasty monster. There's even a blatant "Twilight Zone" reference that provides one of the film's only laughs.
However, the movie really does make these elements into a satisfying whole, constantly taking twists and turns so things never get predictable. The writers and director do a good job blending family drama, horror, and even action, into something that feels wholly unique.
The cast is solid. Haylie Duff brings the heart as a woman struggling to overcome low expectations and become a good mother figure for the troubled girl. Tobin Bell plays a suspicious agent- type who may or may not be a villain. It was great to see Amanda Wyss, from Nightmare on Elm Street, again facing off against a dream-based creature. But the real standout remains Shae Smolik, who glides with ease between being a victim, a heartbroken innocent, and a vengeful threat.
Unusual for Syfy, the production quality was good too. Fantastic cinematography keeps it looking like a notch above. There's a heavy reliance on practical FX from the stunning creature design to a few gruesome kills (one memorable gory moment involves a spinal cord), which work very well. Even the CG, minimal as it was, was above par for this type of film.
My only complaint would be that the movie feels a little rushed. The ending is too abrupt and would be better with an epilogue or something. It almost feels like they ran out of time or money.
Still if you're a child of the 80s like me, and want to see a modernized dark take on those old, great Amblin films this one's for you. At least, until season two of "Stranger Things" starts. Leggo my eggo! -
kosmasp21 November 2022No pun intended - the movie has a girl in the central role. And she ... goes through quite a lot. The beginning alone is enough for anyone to feel sorry for her. But as the title already suggests, there is something (someone) evil ... ok so the title may not really suggest that in and of itself. Maybe because I have seen many (horror) movies - but I kind of knew this was going that way. And the poster/cover was a give away too.
The acting is ok, the story too. If you do not take into account that it is quite predictable. You will know where this is heading. Whether you like the direction or not ... will be up to what you like in movies ... just be aware of that. -
imursel26 October 2019Acting: 3 Story: 4 Production values: 6 Suspence - thriller level: 5 Action: none... Mystery - unknown: 6 Romance level: none... Comedy elements: 2 Overall: 4
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funnycommentor27 March 2022The plot of the movie wasn't very interesting and it was kinda silly. The storyline wasn't well-written and it was very boring. The characters weren't well-developed and they were totally uninteresting. The kills were LAME. In my opinion, it's one of the worst movies I have ever seen, for sure. Also, the acting was terrible. Last but not least, I don't know what happened in the ending, because I fall asleep during the movie..
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ravenhair70223 April 2020I always read the reviews before I do a review, not that it influences my rating...that comes from me alone. I just like to see what others think. Mostly bad reviews, I must admit. I think probably from fake reviews, from producers of the movie or friends or producers. It really does happen. I was pleased to see that Stan Lee had a hand in making this film. I still miss that man. However, if this was a horror movie, I was at no time scared. No jump scares of any kind. No creepy feeling or goosebumps. As a superhero/sci-fi fan, I get the movie. I really do... but to label this a horror movie, eh, I don't think so. I liked it, but it's a one time watch that will not be repeated. It's worth a look. peace