Smile 2 did not make me smile, nor did it make me scream. It did, however, make me roll my eyes, laugh when I wasn’t supposed to, and have me looking at my watch a lot. The original Smile had an ominous tone and used its horror elements to explore themes related to mental health and trauma. This disappointing sequel chucks that tone right out the window, opting instead for blunt obviousness at every turn. As for the themes, the movie’s big revelation is that being famous can suck. Whoever would have guessed?
The central figure this time is Skye Riley (Naomi Scott), a pop star attempting to mount a comeback tour one year after a drug-fueled car accident killed her boyfriend and left her seriously injured. Seeking Percocet for her bad back, she pays a visit to her old drug dealer Lewis (Lukas Gage). Skye has no clue what she’s in for. Lewis has the franchise’s signature curse, which he passes on to her by bashing his own face in with a bench press weight. Suddenly, she begins having weird hallucinations that involve people with creepy smiles.
What we’re asked to believe in Smile 2 is that fame has deeply traumatized Skye. She’s a drug addict, her manager mother (Rosemarie DeWitt) pushes her into professional commitments she isn’t up for, and her ego caused a rift with best friend Gemma (Dylan Gelula). We’ve certainly seen more than a few celebrities go off the deep end, and that’s exactly the problem. Her situation is so cliched that it becomes boring. The movie spends a lot of its excessive 127 minutes showing Skye going through stuff we’ve seen onscreen and in real life time and time again.
The scare scenes are even worse, as the film falls into the exact same trap that foils many horror sequels. It tries to crank up the kind of jolts that were effective in the original. Finn does away with building tension in favor of cheap jump scares that don’t feel organic to the plot. Among the dumbest arrives when Skye awakens from a nightmare about the car accident and sees Gemma’s eyes turn into headlights. That’s hokey. A bizarre transformation while onstage at Madison Square Garden, on the other hand, is unintentionally funny.
Smile 2 might have worked marginally better with a different lead actress. Naomi Scott (Power Rangers) gives a performance that could charitably be described as annoying. The actress never fails to go big, bulging her eyes out, making exaggerated faces, and screaming her dialogue. She starts off at 10, so by the time of the outlandish climax, she’s awkwardly striving to go to 11, 12, and 13. During an embarrassing scene where Skye hallucinates while delivering a speech at a charity event, Scott slaps herself in the face and manically raves. When you look at truly outstanding horror performances from the past few years – Florence Pugh in Midsommar, Daisy Edgar-Jones in Fresh, Lauren LaVera in Terrifier 3 - what they have in common is a degree of subtlety. The actresses understand the need to ground the gruesome proceedings with something real, not match their outrageous intensity.
A draggy pace further slows the movie down, causing it to feel lumbering when it should be tense. Smile 2 never comes close to matching the unnerving quality of its predecessor. A preposterous, overblown finale caps the film, making the eventual sight of the end credits feel like being handed an ice-cold soda following a trek through the desert.
out of four
Smile 2 is rated R for strong violent bloody content, grisly images, language throughout, and drug use. The running time is 2 hours and 7 minutes.
© 2024 Mike McGranaghan