Smile

Dr. Rose Cotter grapples with the emotional scars left by her mother's suicide when she was only ten years old. This tragic event shapes her perspective as a therapist, deeply influencing her interactions with patients and her own mental health.

During an emergency therapy session, graduate student Laura Weaver discusses her haunting experiences following her professor Gabriel Munoz's gruesome suicide. Laura reveals the existence of a sinister entity that can only be seen by her, and in a shocking moment, she brutally takes her own life in front of Rose.

After the traumatic incident with Laura, Rose is interviewed by Detective Joel, who is also her ex-boyfriend. She recounts Laura’s disturbing claims of a curse tied to a haunting smile that now lingers in her mind.

As Rose continues her work, she begins to see terrifying visions of Laura smiling at her in multiple locations. This unsettling presence exacerbates her anxiety, leading her to investigate Gabriel's previous suicide and his bizarre behavior before death.

Rose checks on another patient, Carl Ranken, who is known for his manic episodes. When Carl smiles menacingly at her, she feels a chill of fear, though she later worries that the threats may have been a figment of her imagination.

As Rose's mental health declines, her supervisor Dr. Morgan Desai puts her on a week-long leave. This decision comes after the traumatic events surrounding Laura, as Rose struggles to cope with her experiences.

At home, Rose experiences a horrific vision of Laura and receives a taunting phone call from a security operator. This disorienting moment culminates in further distress when her fiancé Trevor finds her visibly shaken and her cat missing.

During her nephew Jackson's birthday party, panic erupts when Jackson discovers Rose’s deceased cat inside a gift. Overwhelmed by guilt and confusion, Rose succumbs to despair and falls through a glass table.

Desperate for assistance, Rose reaches out to her former therapist, Dr. Madeline Northcott. However, Dr. Northcott dismisses Rose's requests for medication, attributing her hallucinations to unresolved guilt from her mother's death.

In search of answers, Rose visits Gabriel's widow, Victoria Munoz, who reveals unsettling sketches that her husband made of a dark entity. Frustrated by Victoria's lack of belief, Rose leaves, feeling even more isolated.

Rose teams up with Detective Joel to investigate a series of suicides linked to witnesses being haunted. They discover that the only escape from the curse involves committing a murder witnessed by another person.

In a pivotal moment, Rose confronts Robert Talley, a source of information about breaking the curse. His chilling advice that killing someone else is the only way to escape plunges Rose deeper into horror and desperation.

Overwhelmed by her emotional turmoil, Rose drives to her childhood home, where she encounters haunting visions that expose buried resentments towards her mother. This return leads to a terrifying confrontation with the entity.

In a climactic moment, Rose confronts and sets her childhood home on fire in an attempt to escape her torment. However, she finds herself trapped by her memories, spiraling into a psychological breakdown as the entity presses closer.

Ultimately succumbing to her mental anguish and the entity's influence, Rose engages in a devastating act of self-sacrifice, smiling hauntingly. This chilling conclusion underscores the deep entanglement of her trauma and the curse she sought to escape.