Smile Film Review: A Chilling but Flawed Horror Experience

Mixed feelings. That's what I feel about this one. And I wonder if it's because it's been quite a while since I watched a horror film. IT Chapter Two is probably the last one I watched, and it's five years old now. Admittedly, anyway, the film delivers more than the bland title suggests.

As it turned out, there is this sensation that comes with watching horror films and being terrified a couple of times that is kind of satisfying—to me, at least. And so, the times I was startled or scared, I sort of liked that I did in some of them.

Although Smile appears to incline towards what the title implies, especially in the beginning, it focuses a lot more on something deeper and psychologically true—the mind, its capacity, and its role in interpreting reality. And despite the fact that its slowburn comes off as overstretched in some ways, the film delivers in other ways.

After witnessing a bizarre, traumatic incident involving a patient, Dr. Rose Cotter starts experiencing frightening occurrences that she can't explain. As an overwhelming terror begins to take over her life, Rose must confront her troubling past in order to survive and escape her horrifying new reality. _Source

The snippet of the film I watched was what got me interested in the film. And starting off with an eerie beginning of the story, I became even more interested in seeing how it would all pan out. The trouble here, however, and as I progressed, was that I wasn't exactly sure where the story was going.

"How bad will her situation become? If she ever conquers her demons, how would she even begin to do so?" Such questions were on my mind as I watched it. However, getting the answers to questions alone and without elements that would make the film something worthwhile as a horror film was a bit of a perplexity for me through most of the film.

It took about half of the film before it bagan to fully delve into what its type of audience would tune in for—chills, scares, and intrigues. I could feel that it was taking a little longer for the film to develop, but it was worth the wait as there was character development and a lot of times when I got frightened, which I liked and laughed at myself a few times.

At some point in the film, I picked up an important message about our minds and how powerful it is to affect our reality. It was in the ending that it was most apparent—the lesson I learned.

The film strongly focuses on the main character, and I like to think that the performance of her actress largely contributed to how entertaining this film was for me. She had her acting at an impressive level and sold that character and the film to me.

The other characters were alright to me, but it was the main characters that stood out to me, as they should in most cases. The actor's ability to convey the emotions of the main character and project them properly is something commendable that I appreciate in her.

As is usually the case with horror films, there are a lot of gory parts in the film, and they are not subtle. Coupled with the many startling and scary parts of it, you are in for a ride.

Something about this genre of film is that if the cinematography is tightly done, the desired effect on the viewer can be more easily achieved. And this is why the camera works, lighting, and framing for most of the scenes matter a lot. Smile has a pretty decent level of cinematography, enough to keep you in line with the story.

Something that I didn't quite enjoy was the concept of a smile. The idea behind it is obvious, and it is to encourage spooky feelings in the film's viewers. I found this to be sort of redundant and cliche, as I didn't feel its effect or consider it anything to get me spooked.

How the film ends, too, is another thing that I didn't like. The film basically felt like "we're getting somewhere now" for most of its runtime. And so to see the film end the way it did, as though the writers got tired of taking the main characters round and round, made me contemplate if the film was worth my time or not.

I think that Smile is especially good for passing time with some scary to go with it. Its story isn't exactly intriguing, but it wasn't bad either. If a little bit of some gory sights wouldn't be an issue and one is into getting frightened every now and then for two hours, then it sure can work. However, considering that the film isn't deep for me, I will just give it a 6/10 rating.