@cswood said:

I really liked the first movie, so I figured I'd give this a try. Overall it's fun, the jumpscares don't really work for me but the lead actress really sells the character's trauma and acts her ass off.

My issue is that it doesn't really build on the lore of the first movie (we learn absolutely no new information on the Smile demon/cures), and (spoilers) the last 20-ish minutes are extremely predictable because we all know how and where it was going to end. The scene where she tries to leave the hospital room breaks the established lore, so I knew it was an illusion, so I'm just waiting for the other shoe to drop because I knew exactly where she would end up for the last scene. It was inevitable.

That aside it's still a really fun movie and a great performance by Scott. This is the only movie of hers I've seen and actually liked her in so I can only imagine she's just been picking terrible scripts until now.

The first movie is very difficult to finish watching have had it recorded for months. The beginning is good but the camera shots in outdoor scenes are crap and the psychological deterioration of the character isn't original.

----- spoilers --------

I agree. The production is flawless with good visuals and sound design thr scares the shit out of you. But nothing new is explained and pretty much the whole movie is an illusion, which means I pretty much could have just skipped it and went on with "new victim 7 people after the events of first movie is killed by the demon", and be ready for the possivle third movie.

I don't like movies that use "it was all in her/his head" trick. It's really horrible plot solution and should be used very, very carefully in small doses. The ending of this movie completely destroys investment of my attention to this story. So what should I understand from it, what was even real since her infection by the curse? This creates multiple plot holes and ruins the movie, cancelling some really intense moments like it was all for nothing.

And it's especially annoying because it could've been all resolved by a very simple way - everything that happened to Sky when it's in relation to other people should be real, including what she did to her mother. And after her second meeting with Morris, which was suppose to end really bad for him, Skye was suppose to wakeup inside that device on stage, while she is in her bloody hospital gown, and revealed to the audience. Her mother was suppose to be already found, maybe some police presence trying to approach her on the stage, indicating that others are aware of what she did. And then the final act should've happen. This way the entire movie wouldn't be a waste of time, like it is now.

First Smile is much better, with better plot, better actors and better ending. And it was a better horror. What a disappointment after excellent first movie.

@D-magic said:

And it's especially annoying because it could've been all resolved by a very simple way - everything that happened to Sky when it's in relation to other people should be real, including what she did to her mother. And after her second meeting with Morris, which was suppose to end really bad for him, Skye was suppose to wakeup inside that device on stage, while she is in her bloody hospital gown, and revealed to the audience. Her mother was suppose to be already found, maybe some police presence trying to approach her on the stage, indicating that others are aware of what she did. And then the final act should've happen. This way the entire movie wouldn't be a waste of time, like it is now.

See, having her mother actually die goes against what makes the concept cool. The entity is not interesting in killing other people, it's interesting in psychologically torturing the cursed victim. I'm totally ok with doing a fakeout (still have that scene where she thinks she's killed her mom, but then reveal the mom is still alive soon after).

What I would have preferred was, in the scene where she realizes her friend is not in the car and that she is in fact driving the car, she drives it off the bridge into the ocean both as a way to kill herself and as a repeat/way to atone for her causing the car crash that killed her boyfriend; BUT she's saved from drowning by a boat. She escapes and tries to kill herself with a knife, but every time she thinks she's done it she looks and the knife is gone and she's not harmed; the entity won't let her off herself.

Then she finally breaks down and contacts Morris and she thinks she's driving to see him but ends up at the concert and still have that ending that I can tell they really wanted.

We will have to disagree on that, I guess. I prefer much more clever play between what's real and what's not, which was done much better in the first movie. The current solution is very crude, creates multiple plot holes and questions. The problem is that people that were revealed as hallucinations play too important part in driving the plot and appear multiple times through the movie. If her friend Gemma was not real from the start, what about Morris? Was he real? And if it was Skye driving, where did she drive? Or was it hallucination inside hallucination? The plot structure and the events that happen in the movie loose a lot of logic if they are not real, making this a big mess. First movie was not like that, it had clear and consistent logic, even if it sometimes tried to fool the viewers. In the sequel the movie fools itself.

I will give you another example. In the first movie Rose buys a present to her nephew and brings it to the party with a lot of people. When she opens it there is a dead cat inside. Now, according to the movie it really happened, and the scene has huge impact on the viewers because we imagine what did all the people and the nephew just experienced as if we were there ourselves. And we get an insight of what Rose is going through. We put ourselves in her shoes as well. But then imagine, if at the end the movie would say to us "nah, it was all just in her head. all those people, her sister and her nephew didn't really had that experience, she only imagined it". Now I would call that bullsh!t, because it is. You can't do stuff like that to the viewers that got emotionally involved in your story. It turns everything into a stupid joke.

@D-magic said:

I don't like movies that use "it was all in her/his head" trick. It's really horrible plot solution and should be used very, very carefully in small doses. The ending of this movie completely destroys investment of my attention to this story. So what should I understand from it, what was even real since her infection by the curse? This creates multiple plot holes and ruins the movie, cancelling some really intense moments like it was all for nothing.

And it's especially annoying because it could've been all resolved by a very simple way - everything that happened to Sky when it's in relation to other people should be real, including what she did to her mother. And after her second meeting with Morris, which was suppose to end really bad for him, Skye was suppose to wakeup inside that device on stage, while she is in her bloody hospital gown, and revealed to the audience. Her mother was suppose to be already found, maybe some police presence trying to approach her on the stage, indicating that others are aware of what she did. And then the final act should've happen. This way the entire movie wouldn't be a waste of time, like it is now.

First Smile is much better, with better plot, better actors and better ending. And it was a better horror. What a disappointment after excellent first movie.

The first Smile was okay until after the girl patient killed herself in the beginning and then it was a mess afterwards. The bizarre overhead drone camera angles don't help either.

@D-magic said:

I will give you another example. In the first movie Rose buys a present to her nephew and brings it to the party with a lot of people. When she opens it there is a dead cat inside. Now, according to the movie it really happened, and the scene has huge impact on the viewers because we imagine what did all the people and the nephew just experienced as if we were there ourselves. And we get an insight of what Rose is going through. We put ourselves in her shoes as well. But then imagine, if at the end the movie would say to us "nah, it was all just in her head. all those people, her sister and her nephew didn't really had that experience, she only imagined it". Now I would call that bullsh!t, because it is. You can't do stuff like that to the viewers that got emotionally involved in your story. It turns everything into a stupid joke.

I agree with you on this, but I understand from the filmmaker's perspective not wanting to do the exact same thing over again. The Smile 2 scene in the hospital with the mom is different from the first movie, I just don't like the fact it doesn't have any in-movie impact like the dead cat scene in Smile 1. Having Skye act is if she had witnessed her mom dead, and then revealing she's not dead soon after will make all those around her see her as crazy, which would have in-movie consequences. The same as her attempting suicide and failing, and her team trying to keep things under wraps to save her carrier (and their jobs).