The Somnambulist (Solax)

It turns out that there are quit a few films called the Somnambulist including one from 2010. Most were made before the end of the 1910s though, so it seems that sleep-walking was a subject of particular interest to filmmakers long before The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari was conceived. So what is was it about sleepwalking that so fascinated silent cinema audiences? Is there a relationship between anxieties over what one might do in state of sleep and what one might do in the darkened movie hall?

MOVING PICTURE NEWS (15 April 1911): 30