After A Quiet Place: Day One, Longlegs, and Alien: Romulus top the horror charts for the year, Smile 2 arrives in the last quarter and grins as it solidifies itself as one of the year’s top movies. Almost 2 years to the day, Paramount released a devilish sequel to expand the SMILE franchise that serves as a masterclass in movie marketing; taking social media and the box office by storm.
Smile 2 follows Skye Riley (Naomi Scott), a global pop star preparing for a comeback tour after a public meltdown while reeling from a life-threatening car crash. From the same curse we see in the first movie, Skye witnesses the death of someone inflicted by the “Monstrosity.” Now, she has to navigate the expectations of stardom while every fiber of her consciousness is being manipulated by the demon.
Not only did writer/director Parker Finn recapture the originality of the first installment by expanding the powers of the Smile demon/curse, but multiplied it by taking the key theme of grief from the first installment and stitching addiction and fame to it.
“I knew that if I was going to approach a sequel, I didn’t want to just do any sort of obvious continuation or a retread of the first one. I wanted to do something that really had Smile running through its DNA, but also had its own identity, its own metabolism, and offered some audiences something new and fresh and exciting.” Finn said in an interview with ScreenRant.
Naomi Scott’s stellar performance played a huge role in making the movie as terrifying and dreadful as it is. Skye Riley’s portrayal of prestige is sold by Scott’s impressive emotional and physical performances; striking fierce poses and dance moves all while losing her mind and witnessing countless deaths. Not only did Scott find herself practicing choreography just a few days after landing the lead role, but also wrote and recorded an entire original EP to be used in the film and give her character more realism.
Scott personally recounted a scene that took 4 days of the shockingly short 10 weeks of filming earlier this year.
“I’ve never been so exhausted in my life… What else am I doing this for if not that? I’ve wanted this type of creativity, to make something in this way, for so long. So why would I moan about it now?”
Scott’s tireless acting through every twist and turn the story brings is worthy of praise and can be reflective of the film’s exceptional box office numbers. The movie opened on October 18th in 3,619 theaters nationwide (a wide release, typical of horror films) and cashed in $23,021,692 domestically. Since then, the film has grossed $60,540,024 domestically, and $63,100,000 internationally; a current worldwide gross of $123,640,024 in just three weeks. In time we will see if this installment overtakes the numbers of the first movie; a domestic gross of $105,935,048 and worldwide of $217,408,513 at the end of its 14-week theatrical run.
A large part of the film’s success can be tied to the cult-like word of mouth coupled with strategic marketing initiatives. The first movie’s campaign involved actors in branded Smile apparel grinning evilly at the camera at MLB games, the background of the Today Show, and more, causing a massive social media buzz. For the second installment, Skye Riley’s character was personified in social media and pop culture; a real Spotify account with all of her songs are available to stream, and billboards advertising her music as if she is a real artist are present in LA and other cities.
The franchise is far from over. Parker Finn teased future installments while speaking to Collider:
“…Smile is a vehicle to tell really intense and hopefully thoughtful character stories, and so I’d wanna make sure, regardless of if more than one person might have it, that we still find a way to really invest intimacy into the storytelling . That’s super important to me. But I think there are some really interesting tricks still up the sleeves of Smile .”