The Smile: Which Actor Has the Scariest Smile According to a Horror Film Crew?

Here is a horror movie that will make you want to laugh. Parker Finney’s first feature film, noticed two years ago with the short film Laura Didn’t Sleep, Smile confronts a psychiatrist with a mysterious power after witnessing the suicide of one of his patients, with enormous smiling lips.

From now on, the slightest smile will become a source of tension for the character played by Saucy Bacon (Kevin Bacon and Kyra Sedgwick’s daughter), as well as for the audience, with whom the director likes to play when reading trauma. And it is with his actors that he presents a feature film.

AlloCiné: What made you decide to put Smile on your first feature film as a director, Parker?

Parker Finn : It all started with a short film, Laura didn’t sleep, which I did in 2020. It was a really rough draft that turned into a smile. I’ve always been fascinated by what goes on inside our heads, all the accumulated trauma, guilt, anxiety that plagues us. And how we manage to hide all this from the rest of the world, pretending to be normal. I wanted to see what would happen if your mind turned against you and you could no longer trust your feelings and instincts. How your life turned completely upside down.

What did you want to talk about through these terrible elements?

Parker Finn: I was really lucky to be able to make a feature film that straddles the boundaries of genre film. I like to make an impact on the community and I hope it will be the same here. I think it is impossible to completely get rid of what is bothering us and we cannot wear this mask for long. My hope is that this film will give people who know people who seem to be traumatized to deal with them in a different way. So this is a film about compassion in a sense.

It looks like bacon : A smile shows that when we experience childhood trauma, it never leaves us, despite all the therapeutic work we can do on ourselves. I hope that a film like this will allow people who have problems to talk about it and share their suffering so that we can understand them better. So that they don’t feel guilty about their situation.

The fear of catching the virus is bound to be present, to some extent, in the smile scenario.

Is there a person who when they smile really scares you?

Parker Finn: I think Willem Dafoe has a really scary smile. I’ve never met him, but his facial expressions seem unique and complex. His whole face can express fear. It’s fabulous.

Kyle Gallner: I agree. Willem Dafoe is the ultimate master of the creepy smile. No one can top Willem Dafoe.

Do you see how our human relationships have changed with the pandemic and masks? To smile less before?

Parker Finn: The interesting thing is that I wrote this film in the middle of a pandemic, when I could only see the eyes of people I passed on the street or in shops. Of course, all this contributed to intensifying our fear of the other, the stranger. And the fear of catching the virus, and all of this is bound to be present, to some extent, in the smile scenario. I believe that a smile can be as deceiving as a living lie. We are sometimes too inclined to think that a smile is an international symbol of kindness and recognition.

A smile is born in us, it is something primitive, instinctive. When you are a child, smile before you speak. But today we use our smile as a mask to hide our true emotions, our deepest intentions. It is a defense and protection mechanism. It was fascinating to me to turn the concept of a smile around and make it something dangerous and dangerous.

Jesse T. Asher: I feel like people express themselves more through their eyes because that’s how they’ve learned to smile for over two years. I think human relationships are more fragile than ever, especially after two years of isolation. I find it difficult to be normal and fearless around others.

Bacon looks like: During the pandemic, the mask has almost become a part of our body. I am surprised from time to time when I put my hand on my face while talking, as if I miss the mask. It’s really strange. Of course, human relationships are different, the fear of others seems more intense than ever. Before the pandemic, I had no problem visiting the sick in a hospital or rehabilitation center, but not now. I had to go to the ER the next day and felt uncomfortable and scared in that environment. It’s as if we were robbed of the opportunity to not be afraid.

Interview by Roxana Bina in Los Angeles, September 25, 2022