A pop star gets haunted in creepy horror sequel

The first Smile movie was a surprise horror hit back in 2022, landing big at the box office and earning plenty of fans. Now, writer-director Parker Finn has returned with the bigger, bolder Smile 2.

Based on Finn’s 2020 short film Laura Hasn’t Slept, the first Smile film introduced audiences to its killer concept. People are haunted by some kind of demonic spirit that haunts and finally possesses them, manipulating their sense of reality, causing them to see people creepily smiling at them, before finally causing them to commit suicide. The trick is, the person is forced to take their own life in front of another person, who then becomes the spirit’s next target. As the characters in the first film discovered, the only way to survive is to kill someone else in front of another person.

That’s how Smile 2 opens, with Kyle Gallner’s Joel, having witnessed Sosie Bacon’s Rose suicide six days earlier, frantically attempting to survive his ordeal. The curse does get passed along, and eventually ends up sticking to Skye Riley, a famous pop star played by Naomi Scott.

Riley has been dealing with her own troubles over the last year, having gotten herself sober following a car accident that injured her back and killed her celebrity boyfriend Paul. Now, just as she’s about to head out on her comeback tour, she watches a man brutally kill himself, then starts seeing the smiling people everywhere and losing track of reality. As she tries to hold herself together under the weight of her personal and career pressures, her life only seems to fall apart further.

Much like the first film, the sequel gets by heavily on its creepy images, well-timed jump scares, and a solid sense of humor to lighten things up when it all gets a bit too dark or depressing. With a bigger budget, though, the film expands in scope and scale, including impressive scenes of pop concert pyrotechnics.

Smile 2 also stars Rosemarie DeWitt as Elizabeth, Skye’s overbearing mother/manager, Lukas Gage, Dylan Gelula, Peter Jacobson, Miles Gutierrez-Riley, and Raúl Castillo.

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Release date, rating, and runtime

Gore galore, and a longer running time to match

With the opportunity to make a sequel, director Parker Finn not only went bigger in scope, he also made the movie longer, too. 127 minutes, which is a hefty running time for a typical horror movie. But Finn makes use of that time by filling it with plenty of terrifying scenes, and some incredibly gnarly gore, which really earns the movie its R rating. I watched the film in theaters at a general audiences screening.

What I liked about Smile 2

Plenty of laughs and scares, anchored by a terrific lead performance

Paramount

The secret of Smile’s success was how fun it was, both in its effective horror, and also its dark sense of humor. Those qualities remain in spades in Smile 2. First of all, when it comes to being scary, the movie does the trick, with several creepy sequences leading up to very well done jump scares. The smiles themselves are a frightening enough image, and the sequel takes it to another level, particularly in one memorable scene in which Skye is confronted with a group of smiling backup dancers crawling toward her in her apartment. There are several other bravura sequences, including the film’s opening, which is done to look like one long, unbroken take.

Between all the terror, the movie also finds a great balance between the dramatic stakes for Skye, and enough funny moments and jokes to give the audience some release. A lot of the humor comes from certain side characters, particularly Dylan Gelula, who plays Skye’s former best friend, who she cut out of her life at the height of her addiction struggles. But Naomi Scott herself is no slouch in the comedy department, often earning moments of laughter from a perfectly timed facial expression alone.

In fact, Scott is the film’s greatest asset all around. Most of the film is built around her, requiring her to go through just about every emotion imaginable, all while credibly portraying a famous pop star. As the haunting builds, and reality slips further and further away from Skye, we get to see Scott really give it her all, becoming more antic and erratic, like she’s about to explode. It’s a terrific performance from a star finally getting her time to shine.

The sequel also continues the film’s intelligent exploration and depiction of suicidal depression. In Smile 2, issues of social and career expectations, the troubles of fame, and ideas of self-perception become more central. It all leads to a whopper of an ending that also acts as a perfect setup for another sequel.

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What I didn’t like about Smile 2

Too much of a good thing?

Paramount

There are two real issues with Smile 2, though I will admit, they didn’t bother me all that much in the end. The first is simply the running time. The original film was a few minutes shy of two hours, which is already a little on the long end for a horror movie. The sequel is over two hours long, and while it’s never boring, and I certainly never checked my watch, it still feels long. While I’m not sure what could be reasonably cut out of the film, I did overhear some audience members complain that some things, including the horror sequences, got a bit repetitive.

That also goes for the film’s second real issue: the reliance on jump scares. Personally, I love a movie filled with good jump scares, and in my opinion, Smile 2 has got them. One jump scare was so well-timed and surprising that after screaming out loud, much of the audience began laughing appreciatively. But it really does rely on those loud, startling moments a lot, and at a certain point, late in the film, they do begin to feel less and less effective. There are horror fans out there who dislike jump scares in general, and I doubt Smile 2 would win them over.

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Verdict: Should you see Smile 2?

You’ll be itching to see Smile 3 when it’s over

Paramount

Smile 2 isn’t reinventing the horror genre, or pushing the boundaries of gore and good taste like the season’s other big horror sequel, Terrifier 3, but it delivers well-done scares, a fantastic lead performance from Naomi Scott, and a whole lot of fun. What more could you really want out of a horror movie? It helps that the ending of the movie leaves things in a place that will have you more than eager to see what happens if and when Smile 3 hits theaters.

delivers well-done scares, a fantastic lead performance from Naomi Scott, and a whole lot of fun.

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