Smile

So, I'm reading T. R. Holtzclaw "Travis H.'s bile-spewing review below and I'm thinking, "Kevin Dillon's character from 'Platoon' LIVED!!! ... and he just attacked 'Smile' with the butt of a shotgun!!"While "Smile" is no one's idea of great cinema, it's hardly the utter waste Travis felt compelled to warn the planet about. On the negative side, the pacing of the story, due to some "Afternoon Special"-style editing, runs too long in many scenes. It's this T.V. style of movie making that nearly robs this project of the impact it plainly is striving for. A by-product of this is that the lead girl is a bit too successful in conveying teen self-centeredness at its most grating (a problem easily managed through some deft use of the remote), where a couple less scenes of this sort of exposition would've made the point while tightening up the movie nicely. At least one reviewer below thinks Cheri Oteri brings too much SNL - for me, she brought just enough, if only because it raises the tempo of the movie from its lethargic stroll. She tones down her wilder style, leaving the impression of some inspired improvising, and next to the other people on screen, her character is a splash of technicolor flitting around a field of sepia-tone. She's just too close to some real humans I rely on for comic relief to be seen as anything but a plus for this flick.For those in the audience learning Chinese, this has more than a smattering of clear Mandarin used to propel certain parts of the story. That the Chinese father and daughter home-study their way to some fairly impressive english can be seen as either promoting the Asian stereotype of genetically pre-disposed brilliance ... or borderline laughably off the mark.Where the movie succeeds, in particular the DVD rendering with its extras, is in the light it sheds on special projects that've been set up to provide kids around the globe with medical treatment for birth defects. The final 1/5th of the movie seems to get the pacing and acting right (just in time!) to convey the strong emotional impact this kind of work can have on the patients and caregivers, alike. As the story concludes and drifts into the final credits, the choice of music is also a particularly effective touch that continues to carry the tone of both melancholy and great relief that are at the heart of the real drama on which the movie is based.

I was honestly hoping this movie wasn't as bad as I had heard. I bought it simply because Sean Astin was in it, and he was the only reason I even endured it. His character was one of the only enjoyable, likable and realistic characters in the film. The rest I either wanted to slap or was indifferent to.Katie, the main character, was awful. She plays two boys off against each other, throws temper tantrums, orders her parents around and in the end gets exactly what she wants. I understand that at the end of the movie, she's learned a lesson. (What that lesson was I don't really know.) But it loses it's impact when the entire time she's treating people like crap, she's being told how wonderful she is.Both of her "boyfriends" are just terrible. And the movie ends with no clarification between the characters, except that's she's back together with her borderline abusive boyfriend and her fling is with her best friend. And what was with her sex life? No, nothing happens. But what exactly was the purpose of us hearing about it, watching her almost give in, having her mother drill into her head that she "must take birth control every day just in case!" Or her parents marital problems? How did any of it add to the movie? I don't even see how any of it made sense to the plot, since almost NOTHING was resolved at the end of the film...The parts in Shanghai were much better than Katie's story. But even so, some of the moments with the father are uncomfortable and just plain weird.Like I said at the beginning, I bought this movie because of Sean Astin (and I LOVED his character - I wish he was my teacher!), but considering he's only in half the movie... Smile was an okay movie. But only okay. And only because of Astin and a handful of minor characters at the "Doctor's Gift" hospital.

Wow, what an incredibly touching story. The premise of the sub-plot involves a group medical mission to China, somewhat along the lines of Doctors without Borders. It's a different group, and there's no religion involved in this film. It turns out the medical group welcomes volunteer students from High School honors classes to travel with them and they earn citizenship credits in school. This leads to an opening sequence in the classroom where Sean Astin is the teacher, recruiting students.The scenes which begin to tell the story in China are wholly gut wrenching. If this weren't also a true story, we might lose interest when the teen-agers acting skills are occasionally a bit wooden. But the adoptive father in China is incredibly noble, and long-suffering. He risks everything to attempt delivering his adopted daughter to the care of the traveling physicians and the chance for her to experience a normal life of her own.Break out the Kleenex box for this one. The real life events which transpired took a highly circuitous route, almost making the happy ending seem impossible to attain. If you enjoyed  Yes, Virginia, There Is A Santa Claus: The Classic Edition , I believe we have here a similar theme that compliments the Christmas season.

I liked the movie. Cost is just too much to order movies from Canada because of shipping and US/CANADA exchange rate.

great move

A moving and emotional story, certainly well worth owning ,I would recomend it to all ages,will enjoy watching it again,,,,,,,,,,

This is a great movie. Teaches there is more to life than name brands and parties.