The Smile Man Movie Review: Sarath Kumar’s crime thriller becomes yet another run of the mill serial killer story

2/5

The Smile Man Movie plot

Chidambaram Nedumaran who is a high-ranking police officer, had once been part of probing a serial killer case. Now diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease and given only one year until when his fading memories will last, Nedumaran is once again tasked to reopen the case when killings in similar fashion take place. What happens when his personal life gets tangled and his vanishing memories are only doing more harm than good to him?

The Smile Man Movie review

A story on serial killer and why the killings are taking place may not need logic, if the cause can leave you deeply resonate emotionally with the killer. Or if that is not the case, an unabashed logic that the audience failed to crack can make a serial killer story a success. Which is also the reason why Sarath Kumar as Loganathan in Por Thozhil is still a talking point even as the actor donned the same khaki uniform for at least next 3-4 films.

Also read: Actor Sarath Kumar Interview: On playing Alzheimer’s patient in The Smile Man, cop roles, Siddharth 40 | EXCLUSIVE 

In The Smile Man, where Sarath Kumar’s Chidambaram Nedumaran is once again a cop on chase for a serial killer, we understand that his fading memories are doing more bad than good to him. The killer leaving a similar pattern of a smilingly scarred face of his victims is the only cue, that the police get to work on cracking the case. But where the film begins to lack is when a constructive narrative is absent, and is further let down by a lazily written origin story for the villain. It could also amount to saying how you never fail to understand why the killer even began to do what he does, because there isn’t much time to dwell on his feelings. The makers think dialogues and mere throw in words work well as emotional reasoning when it is not at all the case.

Without revealing spoilers and context, a particular character in The Smile Man, is shown to be content and happy with his job that is considered inconvenient, unpleasant and extremely demanding. The reason the character gives to feel his workplace heavenly is the construct that determines the killings. These statements are spelled out verbally to give the audience a reason to why the certain character is like that, instead of shown. The result is lack of empathy on the particular character that serves as the backbone. With marring missteps and disjointed narrative, the filmmaker duo Syam and Praveen resort to banking on a last-minute emotional flashback which results in a hurried and uninvested writing.

Also read: Smile Man teaser OUT: Sarathkumar plays an Alzheimer's patient in his 150th film

The Smile Man’s screenplay too is lethargic. We are way ahead intimated about the murders, thanks to a particularly jarring background score. As the killings continue to happen, and Nedumaran is once again back on the case, one would expect his Alzheimer’s side effects to kick in and play a dominant part in the story. Given the weightage of what the disease of him has already been told to us, it feels his condition is not taken serious enough but as a mere tool of depart the story with easy exit points for scenes. Instead, had the writers concentrated on building a character-driven story that is independent of convenient flashbacks and spelt-out logics, The Smile Man could have become a much sharper story.

The Smile Man Movie verdict

The Smile Man adds itself to one among the dozen serial killer stories that gets made as part of trend. With a non-coherent storytelling and distanced emotions, the film fails to neither resonate nor engross.