What is Before I Wake about?
An orphaned child's dreams—and nightmares—manifest physically as he sleeps.
Does it have a happy ending? (spoiler-safe)
Bittersweet. It earns its ending, but not everyone gets what they want.
An orphaned boy's dreams and nightmares physically manifest, creating a chilling and melancholy fantasy.
Suspenseful and dreamlike. A full-attention watch at a measured pace. Emotionally it is devastating.
Streaming on Netflix.
Before I Wake parents guide
What we could confirm fits a PG-13: real scares and several jump scares.
- Scare
- Properly scary
- Frightening, not just tense.
- Jump scares
- Several
- More than a couple of sudden jolts.
- Gore
- Light gore
- Some blood or injury, briefly.
- Violence
- Some violence
- Some fighting or peril.
- Sex and nudity
- None flagged
- It is a horror title, so treat our zero as unconfirmed.
- Language
- Mild
- Mild words like damn, hell or crap.
How we rate: an AI reads what is known about each title and tags it 0 to 3; we check the tags against a hand-rated set and correct them by hand when readers tell us. Estimates, not a scene-by-scene review. Spot a mistake? Tell us.
Three questions
- Is Before I Wake scary?
- Yes, properly. Before I Wake is the real thing without being an endurance test.
- How gory is Before I Wake?
- Light gore and some violence.
- What is Before I Wake rated, and is it OK for kids?
- It is rated PG-13, with real scares and several jump scares. Your call for older kids.
Cast and crew
Directed byMike Flanagan
StarringKate Bosworth, Jacob Tremblay, Thomas Jane, Annabeth Gish, Lance E. Nichols, Scottie Thompson
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Before I Wake is on our Horror on Netflix list.
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Uses the TMDB API; not endorsed or certified by TMDB. Intensity, content, tone and pace tags are CouchRot's own.