The name “Teeth” may ring a bell with you. It’s a film that had audiences laughing and squirming simultaneously last year at Sundance, where it earned an acting prize for its fresh-faced, fearless star, Jess Weixler.
But if not — and there’s really no polite way to phrase this, so we’re just going to throw it out there — it’s about a teenage girl who discovers that her vagina has teeth. Yes, she is a living example of the vagina dentata myth, a concept that actor Mitchell Lichtenstein explores in writing and directing his feature debut.
Lichtenstein’s movie is a darkly funny homage to 1950’s sci-fi B-flicks (the nuclear plant cooling towers looming behind the girl’s nondescript tract house, which may have caused her deformation, are an amusing touch) but it’s also a female revenge tale. It’s an interesting mix that eventually goes haywire toward the end, when Lichtenstein seems intent on one-upping the gross-out factor he’d established early on. (You do see severed, um, parts.)
For a while, though, it’s easy to get engrossed in the surreal suburban life of Weixler’s squeaky-clean Dawn, a pretty, poised high school student who goes around speaking to groups about the importance of abstinence. She’s part of an organization known as The Promise, and gives out red plastic rings for kids to wear as a reminder of their chastity. Even kissing is a no-no. But Lichtenstein never makes fun of her, and Weixler, whose wholesome blond looks are reminiscent of a younger Heather Graham, treats the character with just as much respect.
Dawn may be fiercely protective of her innocence in reaction to an event that took place when she was a very young girl, something she doesn’t even remember but we see at the film’s start. Her new stepbrother, Brad, tries to mess around with her while the two are in a kiddie wading pool and gets “bitten”; years later, grown-up Brad (John Hensley from “Nip/Tuck”), is tatted, pierced, perpetually stoned and hates women. But he still wants to do it with Dawn, and the fact that she’s so fearful of her budding sexuality only makes her more desirable.
Being a teenager, though, her curiosity eventually takes over and she allows herself to become interested in a boy in the abstinence group, the slightly goofy Tobey (Hale Appleman). But when he tries to go too far with her while swimming at the lake one afternoon, he learns too late that no really does mean no. A visit to the gynecologist to find out what’s wrong with her also has disastrous consequences. (It’s the film’s funniest scene, mainly because we all know what’s coming and the arrogant doctor doesn’t).
Eventually, “Teeth” bites off more than it can chew (sorry, couldn’t resist) as Dawn feels increasingly comfortable in her own skin and begins seducing men who deserve their comeuppance. (Its climactic moment, if you will, is way too over the top.) And a subplot involving her dying mother seems out of place in contrast with the comedy.
But it’s easy to imagine “Teeth” gaining a cult following through midnight showings; it’s the kind of movie you want to watch with friends, to laugh and scream and not have to think too hard, and then who knows? Maybe go home and get lucky afterward.