american – Movies of the Soul

Vampire Owl: We should also call for full disclosure of past events.

Vampire Bat: There have been no relevant events in the castle for some time.

Vampire Owl: Relevant or not, there are few things we should all know.

Vampire Bat: Dracula Castle is an open and free world.

Vampire Owl: Yet, it holds many secrets.

Vampire Bat: You can always know them in detail if you just ask Uncle Dracula.

Vampire Owl: Dr. Frankenstein has warned about not asking too much.

Vampire Bat: Mr. Frankenstein is not someone we should follow.

Vampire Owl: Well, he is Frankenstein the most awarded scientist.

Vampire Bat: He has awarded too much for his fake inventions and discoveries.

[Gets a ghee podi idli and three cups of Kodaikanal tea].

What is the movie about? :: Jane Blankenship (Eve Hewson) finds herself kidnapped and tied up by strangers and she wonders how she has reached this situation of bondage. It is later revealed that her boyfriend and cybersecurity specialist named Daniel Kellner (Josh O’Connor) had stolen top secret material from his employer, a secret United States government organization working privately, known as the Wardex Corporation. Daniel had stolen an artifact of extraterrestrial technology along with many years of documents and hard drives which have footage of extraterrestrial encounters dating to the Roswell incident which had a conspiracy theory related to the United States military recovering a crashed extraterrestrial spacecraft. While many UFO proponents claimed that the Roswell debris really had an alien spacecraft, Daniel finally finds himself with proof about some of it. Daniel threatens the people form organization with the extraterrestrial device he possesses and manages to save Jane and escape.

So, what happens with the events here as we just keep looking? :: As Daniel and Jane try to hide somewhere one would least expect them to be, they approach Sister Maura (Elizabeth Marvel), the Abbess of the Monastery of Saint Clare of the Dawn, as Jane reveals that she was part of the novitiate to become a nun, much to the surprise of Daniel. She adds that she lost her calling and not her faith, as Daniel reveals that he has information which should go to the public and should not remain hidden for long. Jane has her doubts, but trusts him on the same, and decides to leave with him to a safehouse on the very next day, even though the nuns tell her that she can stay there as much as she wants. At the same time, NBC meteorologist Margaret Fairchild (Emily Blunt) is preparing for work when a northern cardinal bird flies into her home and seems to talk to her. The incident stimulates a psychic ability in Margaret to get into people’s thoughts and also speak in languages she has never learned, with her starting with Russian and Korean, the least possible languages she could ever speak.

And what more is to happen here against all odds with twists? :: Getting late to her office while being stopped by the police, she gets directly to a live weather broadcast, and begins speaking in an unknown language, and collapsing right after delivering the words. This alerts the Wardex Corporation which listen to the same words and they send their own people posing as FBI to the hospital where she is admitted. Surprisingly, she is able to identify them as not real FBI and escape with her intuitions. Daniel and Jane reach at the safehouse arranged by the group of people who intend to reveal the truth to humanity. He explains to Jane that Wardex has been experimenting on extraterrestrial creatures who were captured in the last few years and are reverse engineering their technology – he considers himself to be among the chosen people who are to reveal the truth about human brutality on aliens. After watching the clip of Margaret speaking the extraterrestrial language, he understands it in English, surprising him. Now, both Daniel and Margaret intend to find each other to solve all of these, but the corporation has other plans.

The defence of Disclosure Day :: The movie sets up the narrative really well, and has us interested in the movie which establishes some mystery in the beginning and provides us the feeling that something big is sure to follow. The first few sequences had elevated the mood and had us ready to go through the whole thing while feeling full tension, never taking our eyes off the screen. There are some fine visuals and nice sound effects to go with the same, and the feeling of mystery is well-supported by the same, as we keep having the feeling that the paranormal is always around, and the situation created there by something extra-terrestrial uses the effects so well. There is a lot here to explore, starting from corporate opacity, journalistic integrity and whistleblowing to the spiritual side itself, with more than one method provided to look at divinity and morality while facing unexpected situations. Emily Blunt steals the show with her performance too, especially in the beginning stages. Eve Hewson does the same, and her character is in such a multiple level complication that we feel the same so well. Josh O’Connor does a fine job too.

The claws of flaw :: There are too many whistleblowers, journalists, cyber security experts, corporate executives and highly underused personal relationships leaving so many character arcs feeling rushed beyond repair. From the half point, the movie starts a certain amount of drag, with we finding more dialogues than action, and some of them just seemingly stretching the content to that run-time which was never really suitable here. There seems to be so many moments without which the movie could have done well enough, and we cannot keep ourselves from thinking that it has been over-complicated. Then there is that ending which does not really end, and keeps us wondering what it was about, and we still cannot feel that there is a chance for a sequel. The loss of strength as the movie nears the end is a nail right on the head of the alien flick which has been considering itself intellectually and morally superior. Even though we had fallen in love with the movie too early, it only takes half of its journey to decrease our love for the same – the struggle feels real from then.

How it finishes :: Disclosure Day goes on a little bit too long a journey to go through its content which is not much to elongate to its present situation, but its serious way of dealing with the subject has us interested from the first moment itself. The ups and downs of the movie are so much that we feel that the journey is through a highland-lowland combination, driving a slow-moving sedan which is not that easy to steer with roads having too many twists and turns with heavy traffic and not that width. The way in which characters are thrown in there without that much of a development reiterates the same. But that premise is so much interesting to not choose to travel in the path, as keep thinking, and also wondering about what we come across in a divergent way. One might just need to make sure that that enough time is reserved for the same, as watching it in one sitting might need more attention and patience. Then we remember that there is no overdose of anything, and we have aliens coming in as much realistic as they can, for we have alien rights mode activated as if it is about human rights. Jio Hotstar seems to have this one running well in the OTT mode.

Release date: 12 June 2026
Running time: 145 minutes
Directed by: Steven Spielberg
Starring: Emily Blunt, Josh O’Connor, Colin Firth, Eve Hewson, Colman Domingo, Wyatt Russell, Henry Lloyd-Hughes, Elizabeth Marvel

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@ Cemetery Watch
✠ The Vampire Bat.

Vampire Owl: Vampires are not really supposed to give good smiles.

Vampire Bat: Our smiles are the shadows of the smiles.

Vampire Owl: You mean to say that shadows have smiles.

Vampire Bat: Yes, those are the perfect scares that anyone can have.

Vampire Owl: The shadow of a smile. Sounds like it would make a fine movie.

Vampire Bat: Well, vampires make no movies at all.

Vampire Owl: Dr Frankenstein once told me about a particular movie.

Vampire Bat: That vampire movie was not made by vampires.

Vampire Owl: Well, Mr Frankenstein talked about a half-vampire.

Vampire Bat: I warn you – do not trust anything that smiles, even a Frankenstein.

[Gets a chilli porotta and three cups of Munnar tea].

What is the movie about? :: Joel (Kyle Gallner), a police officer who was cursed by an evil entity tries to transfer the curse to a new person by killing someone in front of another, as it would make him commit suicide and transfer itself to the watcher otherwise. The curse passing in the usual manner past smiling hallucinations when he dies – right to someone he knew would be unbearable to him, and therefore he chooses a murderer and his brother, killing one and making the other witness. But in the resulting shootout after he kills a brother, the witness is also murdered. But a drug dealer named Lewis (Lukas Gage) is a silent victim to all of these incidents and the curse lands right up on him. With Joel getting hit by a truck while running away, nobody gets to know about this particular evil spreading to Lewis, and ready to bring the horror working through people and their smiles. Lewis is unaware of this, but begins to have hallucinations.

So, what happens with the events here as we just keep looking? :: Skye (Naomi Scott) is a New York-based pop music star who is ready to make a reappearance to the public after a long struggle with substance abuse and a car accident which killed her boyfriend and severely injured her. She still feels her health, and with the need to get back to the drugs, she reaches the home of Lewis, one of her high school friends who continues to deal with drugs even after the incident. At his apartment, Skye witnesses Lewis screaming and panicking, but soon finds him smiling, and brutally killing himself. A scared Skye leaves the place, not wishing to be found near the corpse and the drugs. This makes her situation worse, with the hallucinations all around and seeing people with some terrifying versions of smiles feels like a natural thing for her. At the same time, she receives a message from an unknown number, talking about her presence at the apartment when the friend was killed, and about the knowledge of what is going on with her with the hallucinations resembling a supernatural presence. But can this smiling evil be stopped in time?

The defence of Smile 2 :: This one has a new idea, and even though shown in its predecessor, most of us might not have watched it. The franchise is indeed a setup for some new kind of horror, which transforms smiles into something terrible, the evil that needs to be feared. There are not many occasions when innocent smiles from children can be scary, but this one surely has that quality and keeps us in the lair of fear. The main character keeps us glued too, as the performance is of top quality and the same person works out of trauma. The creepiness never leaves the movie, and we know that from the beginning itself. There is the challenge to see beyond what meets the eye, and beyond the surface and the jump scares, this one raises the bar. The psychological elements and celebrity culture, all gets a few moments here. There is a certain emotional side here too, as the terror goes beyond everything that could be imagined. The smiles, you take them scared, and those scares coming out of nowhere with an even terrifying finish.

The claws of flaw :: The movie does not use its resources to the maximum effect, with hallucinations taking too much time than reality, and seemingly wasting time to make this movie longer than the usual horror flick. These visions could have actually been more terrifying and far away from reality, instead of keeping us in confusion. Too many false visions with incidents that do not happen only spoils the overall quality, and an ambiguous side helps nobody. This is also too powerful a supernatural force, and with all realities of perception changed, there is not much to fight with for the protagonist, making the movie feeling a world without hope, especially with that particular ending. When there are too many things shown, and with none of them happening or even leading to a change in the end, too many things feel to be unnecessary. In the end, the movie might be found guilty of overdoing certain things, and in the end, it remains not that movie which everyone, or every horror lover would like to watch.

The performers of the soul :: Naomi Scott does a perfect job in this movie, and she is the one person who elevates the flick by a long way – there are so many moments of her to remember, like Margaret Qualley and Demi Moore did in The Substance, another movie which had enough of the drug abuse and something far away from reality with hallucinations playing a major role. That movie had more to work with, and there is quality written all over it, but with the help of horror, this one surge forward led by Naomi. The movie almost completely rests on Naomi, and she makes sure that it stays that way. The next significant character seems to be the one played by Dylan Gelula, who stands strong to give her company. Lukas Gage makes a fine impression in the beginning stages itself. Peter Jacobson’s role could have been more significant to the incidents which were to follow, but it is moved to the backside, but we hope there will more from him in a sequel. The other performers also play along, even though the focus remains on the lady in the centre.

How it finishes :: Smile 2 makes one wonder why the first movie was missed, and it is strange that such a horror movie was not brought to the theatres here – the first one would have set a better beginning to the series, but watching the second one first feels fine too. The idea of smile itself is so well used here, and when we see someone smiling so well and when that makes us scared, it provides another level of scares. Smile 2 is quite a creepy horror movie, but remains predictable, with too much of hallucinations that deviate the movie from its original path and at times confuses people. The scares do work and the social commentary is effective, making it that movie which often stands above the usual horror movies with supernatural presence. With a third entry in the series, any confusion could be solved, and the ending is just nicely setting up for the same. This one surely adds to those nice deviations in horror.

Release date: 18th October 2024
Running time: 127 minutes
Directed by: Parker Finn
Starring: Naomi Scott, Rosemarie DeWitt, Miles Gutierrez-Riley, Kyle Gallner