Rose forgives herself at that moment, but that doesn't deter the creature, which transforms into a monstrous version of Rose's mother. She sets the creature on fire and runs out of the house. With the curse seemingly over, she visits Joel in the Smile ending to apologize for pushing him out of her life.
Fully possessed by the demon, Rose douses herself in gasoline and sets herself on fire — just as the real Joel bursts inside her home and witnesses her death, becoming the next victim. Pretty dark stuff!
There's obviously a reason why the smile demon appears as a giant, looming depiction of Rose's Mom during the final act. One of the most unsettling moments in "Smile" takes place just before that when Rose's trusted therapist, Dr. Northcott (Robin Weigert) reveals herself to be the demon.
In the movie Smile, the demon uses past trauma as a weapon to latch itself on to its host, eventually killing them. The only way from the host to survive is to kill someone with a witness, so the demon latches itself on to the witness.
Even though Rose did everything she was supposed to do — that we're supposed to do to process our own trauma — the monster still won. The cycle will continue. Smile writer-director Parker Finn characterizes the two endings of his film as an attempt to get ahead of audiences' expectations.
Finn says the face at 1:48:20 is a “true look at the evil thing that's been hiding behind all the smiles.” They called the entity Lollipop — thus explaining the use of The Chordettes' “Lollipop” at the start of the end credits — and this is what happens at the end of every cycle as the beast physically enters the ...
She pours it on herself and lights a match. After spending our time seeing things from Rose's perspective, often in uncomfortably closeup shots, we see her final moments through Joel's eyes, who can't look away despite his horror. The curse has now been passed on to him.
So, the entity uses Rose's body to pour gasoline all over the psychiatrist, lighting a match just as Joel comes through the door. Rose's body is smiling while she burns away, and we can see in Joel's eyes he will be scarred for life by that disturbing suicide.
The final moments of the film see Joel rushing in too late to stop Rose from immolating herself. Her apparent suicide passes the trauma on to him and keeps the cycle going.
Ok so the movie Smile is based around a curse/entity that feeds and spreads through trauma. The main character Rose gets the Trauma both from her mother's death when she is young and also seeing her patient who had the Trauma die violently.
The demon can alter a person perceptions to mislead them into thinking they've managed to beat it, before resuming the haunting as before. As such, the only way to be rid of this entity is to pass on the curse which carries it on to another person.
It is a sadistic and violent demonic entity that feeds off of the trauma of its victims, tormenting them to sustain itself, but also because it enjoys causing its victims to suffer, until they eventually kill themselves, or until it possesses them and forces them to kill themselves.
What does the monster look like at the end of Smile?
In her final confrontation with this sinister smiler, it attacks Rose as a tall and spindly creature, which rips off its face to reveal rows of toothy grins. The demon forces itself into her mouth, just before Joel breaks into her family home.
Smile clearly wants the audience to see the connection between Rose's curse and mental illness. Throughout the movie, characters use therapy buzzwords and often suggest that Rose's mental state is a result of her genetics and past trauma.
Rose begins experiencing hallucinations induced by the demon. Shortly after, she has trouble finding her cat, Mustache, and its tragic fate is revealed during her nephew's birthday party. The boy opens Rose's present to discover her cat's dead body.
The film sustains a strong sense of foreboding and threat throughout, with central themes of trauma and death. There are frequent jump scares and some very strong violence. This movie is incredibly scary and disturbing at the same time.
Why did she Smile at the end of a thousand and one?
“Inez has been through a lot, but she never let her faith walk stop, which is the reason why you get to the end of the film, she could walk away with a smile on her face knowing that she did her part and did everything she could, knowing that he's gonna be something.
A well-used method throughout the film is the technique of inverting camera angles so that you see the city from an upside-down point of view or from side angles. By inverting the landscapes, you see the world as askew. This puts you into the mindset of Rose.
Smile turns that into a literal monster only the victim can see, as though it's a hallucination. The parallels to actual psychosis are striking, and that's why everyone around the main character Rose Cotter initially believes it to be a post-traumatic breakdown as a result of witnessing a suicide.
Joel lies to Ellie in order to prevent her going back to the hospital and sacrificing herself for the good of humanity. Even if she does not want to give her life, Joel's lie still protects Ellie from the mental burden she would have to carry if she knew what really happened.
Joel reveals he was in one following the death of his daughter, and that the scar on his head, the one he previously told her came from someone who shot at him and missed, came from himself. "Sarah died. I couldn't see the point anymore, simple as that," he explains. Still, he flinched when he pulled the trigger.
In The Last of Us finale, Joel unleashes the monster hiding in plain sight: a man who can't walk on the right path because he's wrong – but he's not a villain. “If I ever were to lose you, I'd surely lose myself,” Joel croons in The Last of Us Part II.
