Teeth: Does This Film Bite?

Teeth: if you pay attention to horror news at all you know it is the "movie where the girl's vagina has teeth." I'll tell you my thoughts after having watched it and whether or not it lives up to its campy premise and festival circuit buzz, being out on DVD.

Teeth was directed by Mitchell Lichtenstein and the female lead was done by Jess Weixler. The plot, as plucked from IMDB: "High school student Dawn works hard at suppressing her budding sexuality by being the local chastity group's most active participant. Her task is made even more difficult by her bad boy stepbrother Brad's increasingly provocative behavior at home. A stranger to her own body, innocent Dawn discovers she has a toothed vagina when she becomes the object of violence. As she struggles to comprehend her anatomical uniqueness, Dawn experiences both the pitfalls and the power of being a living example of the vagina dentata myth."

At first the movie almost feels like someone attempting to tap into the same quirky vibe present in a Tim Burton movie. It's hard to explain why, since there weren't elaborate fantasy sets or Johnny Depp with a funky hair-do, but it just felt that way. Yet, at the same time the director, who also wrote the film, put his own stamp on it. There is a reason Tim Burton's stamp is way more valuable though; another thing that cannot be explained and is best felt; ha. The set-up in Teeth is a long one punch joke, meaning everything in the characters lives seems to be about repressed sexual urges, literally every conversation, situation, or shot has something to do with sex; even the holes in trees are lingered on for too long to seem like bodily orifice replicas. The joke is good for a bit, but wears thin really quick.