Smile – An Entertaining Recent Throwback Horror Feature

A film with a premise such as the one in Smile looked to be a hard sell on paper. After the dud that was 2018’s Truth or Dare, creepy smiles are not that scary. Nevertheless, a new set of creepy smiles have dominated the discourse as of late with the biggest example being the recent viral campaign where actors were hidden at a series of major league baseball games. In the end, Paramount wouldn’t go through all this trouble if they didn’t believe in the film. Originally set to be a streaming release for Paramount+, strong test screenings saw the studio give the film a theatrical release instead and here we are. The next question is whether or not that choice is worth it. While that answer is too soon to tell, the film is an entertaining watch that may not necessarily reinvent the wheel in terms of the genre not that it has to. Where the film lacks in originality, it makes up for in execution. Offering some strong scares and creepy atmosphere, it is clearly inspired by a few recent horror classics. A mashup, it does just enough to ground the insanity with a compelling story.

Smile follows Dr. Rose Cotter (Bacon), a therapist whose life is turned upside down after an incident involving one of her former patients. Witnessing a series of unexplained happenings, she is taken on a downward spiral as she is haunted by an unknown entity. Struggling to figure out what is happening to her, her actions and strange behavior only further alienated her from her friends, family, and fiancé Trevor (Usher) as she sank lower and lower. Determined to not meet the same fate as those who preceded her, Rose vowed to get ahead of whatever was tormenting her as a means to save herself and possibly protect others before it was too late. Perhaps lacking in that backstory to root the story in something beyond a mere allegory for trauma and mental illness, her frenetic investigation and subsequent roller coaster character arc was still compelling to watch despite not being original.

Ultimately, Smile was at its best whenever Rose faced her tormentor head on instead of keeping her and audiences at a distance. Subtly building to that inevitable stage through the usual tactic of jump scares that work more often than not, unsettling atmosphere through stellar sound design and camerawork, and the film’s gimmick of character with creepy smiles doing scary things, it offers some decent entertainment though it arguably takes a little too long for the tension and suspense to get going. Clocking in at almost 2 hours, there could have been some tightening made to improve pacing. At the end of the day, the root of the story was Rose for better or worse as in order for her to move forward, she needed to look back at the unresolved trauma that defined her. That being said, the film still had a few tricks up its sleeve that may rub some audiences the wrong way as it attempts to wrap everything together with a neat bow.

The best part of Smile is Bacon’s lead performance as Rose who keeps the film watchable. Grounding it with her likability and relatability, she shows some decent range as a tortured protagonist who goes on a roller coaster of a journey over the course of the film. Though the story may not be new by any means, she makes the most out of it by giving Rose some humanity. Essentially being the focal point of the film, it’s fate will undoubtedly lie with her but suffice it to say, she more than delivers.

Smile will leave the majority of audiences smiling.

still courtesy of Paramount Pictures

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Keith Noakes

The EIC of the coincidentally-named keithlovesmovies.com. A Canadian who prefers to get out of the cold and into the warmth of a movie theatre.