Smile (2022)

Streaming Service: Paramount +
Movie Name/Year: Smile (2022)
Genre: Horror, Mystery, Thriller
Length: 1h 55min
Rating: R
Production/Distribution: Paramount Players, Temple Hill Entertainment, Paramount Pictures, Paramount Home Entertainment
Director: Parker Finn
Writer: Parker Finn
Actors: Sosie Bacon, Kyle Gallner, Jessie T. Usher, Robin Weigert, Caitlin Stasey, Kal Penn, Rob Morgan, Gillian Zinser, Judy Reyes, Nick Arapoglou, Matthew Lamb
 
Blurb from IMDb: After witnessing a bizarre, traumatic incident involving a patient, Dr. Rose Cotter starts experiencing frightening occurrences that she can't explain. Rose must confront her troubling past in order to survive and escape her horrifying new reality.
 

Selina’s Point of View:
For a while, Smile was absolutely everywhere. There was more marketing for this flick than there was for anything else last year.
 
Hype started spinning out of control. I couldn’t turn on anything connected to the internet without hearing something amazing about it. Expectations were high.
 
I think that might be why I feel a bit underwhelmed now that I’ve seen it.
 

I’m not saying it was bad. Although a lot of it relied on jump scares, they were effective. There was also a deeper quality that went into the lasting effects of trauma and grief. It was an elevated horror dressed down to be easily digestible by the masses.
 
In the first half it just felt so common that I was almost bored. I certainly didn’t feel like I was getting enough out of it to warrant all that hype. Especially not after having watched The Menu (2022) for our first movie this week. If anything, I think word of mouth should be pushing that horror instead.
 
Still, Smile was effective and anxiety inducing. I wish I’d gone into it blind. I feel like it would have had a better experience.
 

Cat’s Point of View:
The most insidious sort of evil is that which wears a smile as it conspires to harm you. I was instantly down to watch a movie that built on that concept – and the trailers for Smile were unnerving as all hell.
 
The smiles these actors cooked up – without the aid of CGI – were simply creepy and unsettling. That particular word bears repeating. The whole film was unsettling.
 
Of course, there were a few jump scares along the way, but don’t knock them. Those brief moments gave a little relief to the mounting tension that began to build from the opening scene. It started off so bleak and just amplified from there with each traumatic occurrence on screen.
 
I anticipated a decent movie but didn’t expect how deep the theme would run. The performances, by the by, were outstanding. The reactions of fear, specifically, felt genuine. I had a visceral empathetic reaction to what the characters on screen were experiencing.
 

Smile explored trauma from so many angles. Further, the attention to detail was absolutely phenomenal. I’ll admit that this was my second watch-through and I picked up new little tidbits here and there that I didn’t catch the first time through. There was even a tattoo that I found significant this time around.
 
My nineteen-year-old daughter, who has just begun to dabble in watching horror movies with me, was intrigued enough by my explanation of the plot’s summary that she decided to also watch with me this time. Her reaction when the credits rolled could be summed up with a single quote: “What the fuck?!”
 
Writer and director Parker Finn (The Hidebehind, Laura Hasn't Slept) really had excellent instincts when he expanded his own original short into this feature-length adaptation. I would say Smile could even be called intelligent horror. It had something to add to the grisly deaths and sundry frights. I could see myself watching this one again and would certainly recommend it.
 

Rotten Tomatoes Critic Score – 80%
Rotten Tomatoes Audience Score – 77%
Metascore – 68%
Metacritic User Score – 6.6
IMDB Score –6.6/10
 
Trust the Dice: Selina’s Rating – 3.5/5
Trust the Dice: Cat’s Rating – 5/5
 
Movie Trailer:

Fried Barry (2021)

Streaming Services: Shudder
Movie Name/Year: Fried Barry (2021)
Genre: Comedy, Horror, Sci-Fi
Length: 99 minutes
Rating: NR
Production/Distribution: The Department of Special Projects, The Department of Special Projects, Enigma Ace Films, Panalux, Panavision, Zootee Studios, Shudder
Director: Ryan Kruger
Writer:  Ryan Kruger, James C. Williamson
Actors: Gary Green, Chanelle de Jager, Brett Williams, Joey Cramer, Bianka Hartenstein, Sean Cameron Michael, Steve Wall, Hakeem Kae-Kazim, Tamer Burjaq, Jonathan Pienaar, Colin Moss, Brendan Sean Murray, Ryan Kruger, Marty Kintu, Gaham Clarke
 
Blurb from IMDb: Barry is a drug-addled, abusive bastard who - after yet another bender - is abducted by aliens. Barry takes a backseat as an alien visitor assumes control of his body and takes it for a joyride through Cape Town. What follows is an onslaught of drugs, sex and violence as our alien tourist enters the weird and wonderful world of humankind. FRIED BARRY is based upon the short film of the same name, which earned 57 official selections and 12 wins at festivals around the world.
 

Selina’s Point of View:
The past hour-and-a-half has been torture.
 
Before I go too far into reviewing Fried Barry, however, I need to take a few things into account.
 
First, and foremost, I don’t tend to like experimental films. Much as I love the horror-comedy sub-genre, there are only a small amount that I’ve ever seen that claim to be ‘experimental’. I’ve liked none of them.
 
Secondly, the director didn’t set out to make a good film.
 
Director Ryan Kruger (The Man Who Beat the Man, Prime Circle: Doors, The SA Way) has stated in several interviews that he wasn’t out to make a flick that everyone would like. There are plenty of people that shy away from mainstream film-making, but his intentions go beyond even that. He sought to make something so strange and unique and ridiculous, that it becomes unforgettable by default.
 
He wanted to make a cult film.
 
I thought that was a little bold of him. Bold to assume that a ‘cult’ status is something that you can seek out from the start.
 
Cult cinema is usually eccentric. It involves original pieces that are extremely memorable and re-watchable. If that was the whole definition of the cult genre, then yeah, you could definitely predict if a project was going to hit the mark. But it’s not.
 
It’s not just about how a film is created, written, or even developed. It can be something that comes out in wide releases or just sent straight to video. What makes a cult film is how it’s received.
 

Directors make movies for specific genres. They can seek to make drama, or a horror, or a romance. They can seek to make flicks that settle into sub-genres like teen stories, superheroes, occult, etc. But it’s the audience that makes a film: cult.
 
No director can control the audience.
 
That said, I think Kruger is onto something here.
 
I’m not going to lie, I fucking hate it. There is not a god damn thing that I enjoyed about Fried Barry. Personally, I’d rather never watch any other movies than watch this one again. It was, as I said earlier, torture to sit through.
 
If I look at it through the scope of what the director was trying to do, though…
 
I think there’s a possibility he succeeded.
 
I will never be able to unsee Fried Barry. It will be scorched into my brain for eternity. It’s weird, and ridiculous and absolutely disgusting. And there are people that I know who will see it once and fall completely in love. They will adore it just for its eccentricity and the message they see behind the script. They will re-watch it and pass it along to others.
 
I will look at them strangely, but if those people actually form a cult for this film, they won’t need me or my opinion.
 
Ryan Kruger is a mad genius. Now get me out of here.
 

Cat’s Point of View:

I have stared at a blank page for a bit now, just…unsure how to put what I’m feeling into words in the wake of the credits rolling for Fried Barry.
 
One thing’s for sure, I feel fried by that movie. What the hell did I just watch?
 
Calling it a strange trip seems like it would be both too on the nose and, at the same time, the understatement of the century.
 
Let me revisit my earlier statement. There’s a second thing that’s ‘for sure’ here, as well. Kids should be nowhere near this movie. Not only is there flagrant and graphic drug use, but there are explicit sexual scenes, and some brief male nudity… among other things I can’t mention without spoilers.
 
The runtime for Fried Barry is just a little over an hour and a half, and there’s a freaking intermission break. Why? Did they run out of ideas for scene transitions? It was so brief that I’m not even sure that it was really intended to be used as such, and debated even mentioning it like it might have been a spoiler to do so. It illustrates the absolute wackiness of this film, however.

 
I think the tone is appropriately set when the opening credits list this as ‘A Ryan Kruger Thing.’  Not a movie or production. Its own creator called it a ‘thing.’
 
This is Kruger’s feature-length directorial debut, expanding a short that he had created back in 2017. I haven’t seen it, I’m afraid, so I can’t comment on whether or not this is a continuation of that story or just a revisitation to the character, etc.
 
If I had to sum this experience up in one word, it would be spastic. The story, characters, settings – everything was spazzy. I imagine that anyone watching this under the influence of mind-altering substances might get an entirely different experience – either in enjoyment or a one-way ticket to a bad trip.
 
The crazy thing is that I kind of liked it...a teeny tiny bit. I admit that grudgingly because this was frankly a horrifying and grotesque film experience that I cannot unsee. I was repulsed and drawn in by it at the same time. I spent a lot of time literally saying ‘what the fuck’ to myself, however. There were a few places I just had to laugh. Under all the insanity, there was an actual story. It surprised the hell out of me, to be honest.
 
I can tell you with certainty that I will never watch this again. This is, however, exactly the sort of movie you tell your friends about to get them to watch it in order to share the misery and see their reactions. For that reason, it very well may become a cult hit.
 
Either way, Fried Barry will be available on Shudder May 7.

Rotten Tomatoes Critic Score – 83%
Rotten Tomatoes Audience Score – None
Metascore – None
Metacritic User Score – None
IMDB Score – 6/10
 
Trust the Dice: Selina’s Rating – Pass/5
Trust the Dice: Cat’s Rating – 1.5/5
 
Trust-the-Dice’s Parental Advisory Rating: NC-17
 
Movie Trailer: