Smiley (2012) Reviews

• The New Face of Failure

  fcm4342013-07-07

  The poster for "Smiley" boasts the tag-line "The New Face of Fear" and honestly I did find Smiley's appearance unsettling the first time I saw the trailer. However, all feelings even vaguely related to fear immediately began to disappear less than 3 minutes into the film (more on that in a moment). Still, I give the film one star to stand as a personal reminder for that one moment in time Smiley seemed promising. "Smiley" is not only bad, but it's exceptionally bad to such a fundamental degree in both film-making and writing that every problem is encapsulated in the phrase: "BAD BLANK 101". Bad acting, pacing, atmosphere, dialog, characterization, direction, cinematography, editing, and sound are all astoundingly present as if "Smiley" was the meeting place for the reunion of elements in hack film-making. As a film alone the characters are painfully flat; the acting is atrocious and the main character acts like a being from another planet; the dialog is so bad it smells; every single one of the "scares" are some of the cheapest jump scares in modern horror (that's saying something); the pacing is slower than a slug; during the long-drawn out scenes of fundamental philosophical waxing from the college professor (Roger Bart) that same slug is glued to the floor; I will not spoil anything here because the ending still remains an incomprehensible mess that started in less than 3 minutes. Two minutes and thirty-two seconds into the film is a jump scare by a little girl that is simply a soft then LOUD noise made for no other reason than hack writing. Get used to that because those are the only kind of "scares" in the entire movie. The problems really begin as the audience and babysitter are told by the little girl about an urban legend killer, the titular Smiley, a mysterious killer (in that he's never explained, we're just expected to take the horribly shoe-horned exposition from the little girl that Smiley is a well-known urban legend, yet the audience doesn't know; Gallagher just expects us to blindly accept this). How does the little girl know this? Who is she? If Smiley is based around the NOT-Chatroulette then is it an international urban legend? All of these questions are just a few examples of what I kept asking the film which gave me nothing in return. Then the awful writing comes into play as the audience learns of how "Smiley" is summoned beginning the long endurance test that was this movie. The Smiley killer is summoned (ala Candyman) by typing out the phrase "I did it for the lulz" three times to someone on Not- Chatroulette causing Smiley (dressed in Michael Meyers' one piece jumpsuit) to sneak up behind the person you typed the message out to then stabs them in the back (with Ghostface's knife no less). Let that sink in. The killer is summoned through Chatroulette. Now here's a quick lesson to future horror writers and filmmakers: if you want to create a new horror icon then its important to remember that often timelessness trumps modernity. Sure, technologically based horror movies can make some of the best in the genre (Ringu, Videodrome, Kairo, Christine, Poltergeist, etc) and there's nothing wrong with being hip to the now (if done right), but the technology has to age well and be recognized as being a staple of everyday life with the majority of the public and Chatroulette has not aged well at all. In fact, Chatroulette is stale and by having the killer revolve around such an unbelievably dated concept severely hurts the potentiality for the character only speeding along its inevitable fade into obscurity. Smiley might as well have been summoned by wearing a haunted pair of Crocs. Of course Smiley might have appeared more if the characters were wearing haunted Crocs because Smiley rarely appears in his own film. The rest of the film is just awful acting, horrible dialog, and one middle- finger of an ending. What else is there to say? Smiley is just all-around bad in every single way possible regarding filmmaking and writing dumbing down or ripping off intriguing concepts from far superior horror films to create a poorly-stitched together amalgamation of first year philosophy, general science, and psychology. The only amusement is watching Roger Bart trying to make "I did it for the lulz" sound ominous and if you want to see that I'm sure Youtube will provide for you.

• Smiley had me Smiling

  magic_eight_ball7372012-10-12

  Smiley is a horror film about this unexplained killer that kills people whenever another types in "i did it for the lulz" three times during video chat, whether it be online or local. The thing that's wrong is, the movie had me smiling every bit of the way. Why? 1) The characters weren't really nailed down.... they were sort of all over the place. There were absolutely no character arcs, no character development, zip. Why is Ashley's dad's character even in the plot? We never feel for him, communicate with him... he's an annoyance. 2) The subplots. It seems they were literally created in three minutes. The subplot of the overprotective father, as mentioned before, is just annoying. He should have served in the plot. 3) Don't get me started with the plot. It seems like The Ring... a woman encountering this evil through a computer/television screen and slowly going insane, trying to find out what the evil is. The only difference is, The Ring was a much higher regarded horror film in my sense. Ashley is so emotionally broken, so wouldn't she go insane or into panic attacks the one moment she see's the source of evil? 4) It just ends. Just like that. Unfinished and no loose ends were wrapped up (as if it had any loose ends to be wrapped up). Ashley just falls to her death in slow motion. Then it's the end. The "Smiley's" turn out to be Ashley's friends. Wait, what? Why? They killed her and still bother to stay in the same location for another ten minutes. They don't even check to see if she's okay. Also, if I may add, Ashley shoots Binder in the chest, thinking he's the killer. But then... after Ashley's death... he's alive? Did he know he'd be shot by Ashley? It makes absolutely no sense. Then, to very quickly wrap up the one loose end in the film, Ashley's friend asks, "wait, why did we do this again?". It's as if she knew a Panavision camera was feet from her and she wanted to make sure the audience wasn't confused. Oh, then she gets killed by the real Smiley. WHAAAAA? Yeah. The main "Smiley" types in the "i did it for the lulz" thing three times, which answers her previous question. Then she dies. Then the credits roll. But it doesn't make sense... they typed in "i did it for the lulz" three times with every other "Smiley" in the room in order to prank Ashley, but they didn't get killed. And why did they want to prank Ashley anyways? I like Shane Dawson (Yaw), but this movie disappointed me. Where's the creativity? The point of a film is to use a visual array of metaphorical and hidden images/sounds that the audience needs to dig out. Movies can't be straightforward. Even Disney movies, intended for children, have plot. Oh, did I forget to mention that audiences like irony? Twenty minutes of time it took to write this article out. I can swear that Smiley was written in less than that amount of time without any plans. You need to plan in order to make enjoyable films, right? Hopefully, talented people can actually break into the film industry, because all that are being let in so far are men in business suits hungry for profit. Thanks for taking the time to read my opinion on Michael Gallagher's "Smiley".

• total letdown

  myt012012-10-12

  After watching the trailer and hearing about the cast i had high hopes for this movie. I was excited and couldn't wait, but who knew what kind of disappointment awaited me, after watching the first five minutes you cold clearly see that casting a bunch of untrained Youtube stars wasn't a good choice. Unfourtunally the forced tension couldn't make up for it, the script didn't deliver anything interesting and the obvious twists were pretty easy to predict. Smiley himself had like five minutes of screen time which was even more disappointing and the gore moments were just silly which made them actually hard to watch. This movie lives from the online communities it exploits to help hype the film.

• a new Horrid movie

  dmuel2012-10-18

  Smiley tells the tale of a city full of the most stupid people in America. There seems to be an internet-based killer slaying many people there, and we can only wish him/ her continued success. So bad is this movie--there really is no "plot"--with its bad acting, bad scripting, and not-very-scary killer at work, the viewer prays for a short viewing time. With little gore, scares, sex or even action, this is a B movie wanna-be, so if that's what you're looking for, forget it! The only clever thing about this movie is the idea of a killer wearing a twisted smiley-face hood. After you've seen that on the ad for the movie, it's all down hill from there. Its silly "surprise" ending does nothing to compensate the viewer for the previous 85 minutes of boredom. Do yourself a favor and don't watch this movie.

• Potential but failed

  withitnow2015-02-02

  The premise of this film had potential to be a really good enjoyable slasher but it failed. Low budget doesn't always mean a bad film but think it does here. Caitlin Gerard as Ashley is appalling in this. The rest of the cast is better but not by much. Still watched it. It was OK to pass the time. Needs more gore to be a slasher horror or needs more psychological twists to be effective. I can watch many different types of horrors and whether they cost 10 dollars or 10 million dollars to make, usually I find something enjoyable about my favourite genre. Not this time. I got bored. And Ashley screaming just made me want to vomit. I think even if the acting was slightly more convincing it would be a better watch. Alas it isn't so.