This article contains spoilers for the filmSmile.Continue at your own risk.
WhileSmileis a big-budget horror movie funded and developed to amass a big box office – and it probably will –, the film deals with sensitive subjects such as depression, trauma, and even suicide. Surprisingly, for most of its runtime,Smilehas a positive view of mental health issues, preaching in favor of social acceptance and adequate medical care. Unfortunately, that’s what makes the movie’s ending so enraging. Because in the name of jump scares and a hook for a sequel,Smilecontradicts its message and reinforces the twisted notion that there’s no beating trauma and suicide is inevitable.
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How ‘Smile’ Butchers Its Message
One of the reasons we love horror movies is that, contrary to other genres, they are willing to explore taboo subjects. InSmile, for instance, we have a terrifying experience about trauma and how people suffering from mental health issues can negatively impact other people’s lives. That’s a somewhat uncomfortable stance since, as a society, we’ve been investing a lot of energy into destigmatizing mental diseases and creating a support network people can use to get better. Even so, there’s some truth toSmile’s message, as most people who suffer from mental health issues – this author included – can trace back the origin of their problems to another person who also had some baggage to deal with, more often a family member. Add the fact that we know many psychiatric disorders tend to be hereditary, and it’s hard to argue withSmile’s central thesis. Unfortunately, trauma does carry forward, and if we do not take care of our mental health, we might hurt the people around us.Smiledeals with this complex subject through its paranormal entity, and the movie’s main character, Dr. Rose Cotter (Sosie Bacon).
The entity inSmilecurses traumatized people, scaring them until their minds are broken. Then, the evil spirits possess the victim’s body and force them to commit a gruesome suicide in front of a witness who’ll be traumatized next. Acting this way, this bone-chilling manifestation of trauma can jump from body to body in a never-ending chain of death and misery. In the real world, that’s also what happens when a person with psychiatric disorders goes untreated, putting a strain on their families and friends that can help feed their own mental health issues.
And then comes Rose, who gets cursed by the entity after watching a patient (Caitlin Stasey) in the psychiatric hospital take her own life. While the patient’s death is horrible, it also awakens old traumas inside Rose. That’s because Rose found her mother (Dora Kiss) lying in bed after mixing pills and alcohol when she was only ten years old. As we learn inSmile’s ending, Rose’s mother suffered from severe psychiatric issues that turned her behavior erratic, scaring (and scarring) her daughters for life. That’s why Rose doesn’t call for help once she finds her mother dying and just runs away. She was a frightened child, so we might understand Rose’s reaction. Nevertheless, she is somewhat responsible for letting her mother die, an action that will shape her entire life and lead her to become a psychologist.
At the end ofSmile, Rose decides she wants to break the cycle and defeat the evil entity by facing her past. That’s nothing short of brilliant, asSmileallows its main character to find a solution that reinforces the message it’s trying to build: mental health is a serious issue, and we need to treat it properly. Rose goes to her dead mother’s decaying home, acknowledges her errors, forgives herself for what she has done, and apologizes to the people she hurt. In other words, instead of committing suicide and letting her trauma carry on to other people, Rose does the hard choice of working on herself and fighting trauma. IfSmilehad ended there, the movie would be a shining example of how we can deal with mental health ethically and still have a thoroughly entertaining horror movie. Unfortunately,Smilekeeps going for too long, undoing everything it worked so hard to build.
In a twist that’s not even original,Smiledoubles down on Rose’s recovery, revealing her victory is only a hallucination and that she’s still trapped in the abandoned house. Rose’s mind is finally shattered by the creature, who enters the doctor’s body and lights herself on fire in front of her ex-boyfriend, Joel (Kyle Gallner). And there we go, Joel is cursed, the monster lives, and we can bank on a sequel. Great for the executives, dangerous for the movie. Because that twist inadvertently says that working on your trauma is meaningless, there’s no way to escape the things that haunt us, and it doesn’t matter how hard we fight, we’ll still commit suicide in the end. So why bother? Why try at all?
While trying to squeeze a few more minutes of horror out of its story,Smilemuddles the movie’s message in a dangerous way.Smilecould have been a film about overcoming the scary things that push us to a final and definitive act of self-destruction. Instead, it trades an important message for cheap scares.
