B-movie Review: Teeth

Year: 2007

Starring: That girl from "Guiding Light" and That guy from "Nip / Tuck"

Favorite line in the movie: "I haven't even jerked off since Easter!"

Favorite prop made for the movie: A detailed sketch of a hairy vagina

"Teeth" opens with beautiful panoramic views of suburban America and an original soundtrack reminiscent of early Danny Elfman work. We see tree-lined streets with nice houses, kids on their bicycles and shiny new cars. Then, we see the cooling towers from the power plant in the background. I guess we can assume this is a nuclear power plant, although the key element required for such a thing (a large body of water) is absent. The black smoke tips us off, even though most of us know "smoke" from a cooling tower is actually steam and therefore white, but that's beside the point. We then see our hero and her brother as children. They are in an inflatable pool in the front yard of their home, parents chain-smoking and partaking in some good 'ol fashioned mid-day drinking behind them.

Within the first five minutes of the movie we see evidence of both child abuse and sexual assault between various family members. We then learn the two children are actually step-siblings (this is important for later plot points, so it is repeated a second time to make sure even the most idiotic viewers are sure to catch the hint).

Flash-forward to present day and we see Dawn (our hero) giving a speech about the importance of abstinence more cheesy than I ever thought possible. Much to my surprise (really), we learn that she is actually serious. Dawn is a pure soul with no intentions of being led astray by her peers and their impure desires. She doodles wedding dresses in the margins of her notebooks and has fantasy after fantasy of her wedding day and finally getting to do the nasty with the man of her dreams. She only watches G-rated movies and she's never kissed a boy.


Then we meet the other child from the pool scene, Brad (an actor I really enjoyed in the TV show Nip / Tuck [Matt] and he seems to have brought the same character with him). Brad is an asshole. He is a "type A" asshole that disrespects his girlfriend, plays metal music loud in his parents' house, has a rottweiler trained to kill, wears shirts with the sleeves cut off, and he has a tattoo of a dragon (yes, a dragon) in the middle of his chest.

Through some twists and turns of badly-written plot, Dawn finds herself a victim of date rape, which is where my *favorite line of the movie* comes into play. She fights the guy off of her but he is stronger and pins her down and forces himself inside of her. (The scene is more cheesy than anything else, but in text it seems disturbing, doesn't it?) So, there he is, doing his thing and then... crunch ... He screams like a little girl and tries to fight his way off of her. After a bit of a struggle, he finally breaks away (still screaming like a girl) and we see him standing over her. A dramatic zoom into his nether-regions reveals a bloody mess where his penis used to be. Oh, the horror!

Our hero doesn't know what happened to her forceful lover and decides to seek medical attention. After another similar experience at a gynecologist office, Dawn simply uses google to learn she has an "adaptation" as she calls it. A "toothed vagina," if you will. She finds some Greek mythology on the subject and learns that only her "hero" would be safe inside her, leading us into the classic "true love trumps all" plot line. Somewhere along the line, though, she decides to use her "gift" against those she hates... and any other guy that simply rubs her the wrong way (no pun intended).

Along with a sub-plot of Dawn's dying mother, a sexy cast of malicious young men, copious amounts of squirting blood and a hidden moral not unlike those found in teen television dramas, "Teeth" presents a new take on "the girl next door" sure to leave you rolling hysterically in the isles. Not only is the premise completely ridiculous, but the acting is almost good enough to make you believe this is an actual attempt at a horror movie. Even the ever-present nuclear cooling towers looming in the background of nearly every outdoor shot serve as a nice little reminder that you're watching a completely under-rated cult classic. I give this movie 3 out of five high-pitched screams.

"Teeth" is currently available for instant streaming on Netflix so feel free to check this gem out.

My Days Without The Internet

Having a baby is expensive and taking two months off without pay is not only necessary, but detrimental on one’s financial situations. I like my house, car, electricity, phone and cable a lot. Unfortunately, I had to choose when paying bills and Comcast was at the end of the line. After two months without a payment, my cable box was actually repossessed. Yeah, let that sink in for a moment. I’ll wait…… Yes, repossessed like an unpaid car or an organ transplant I couldn’t afford. My cable box was repossessed!! I didn’t know this was possible and I can’t think of anything more embarrassing for my neighbors to see. Being that I’m surrounded by old white ladies that have nothing better to do than look out their windows, I’m sure everyone saw this guy come take my cable box away. As I write this, I have been without cable or internet for six weeks. (As of press time, it has been over two months!)

I was certain I would break down after being offline for an hour or so. I am addicted to the internet in a bad, bad way. The first day was hard, the second day was a little easier and by the end of week four it wasn’t physically painful anymore. I imagine this is what it feels like to quit smoking, but I have never done that and probably never will. Hey, addiction runs *strong* in my genes.

While offline, there were some necessary online tasks to take care of, as there always are. I have applied for several jobs, and I needed to go online for that. I needed an internet connection when I wanted to check my bank account or upload photos. Other than that, I could get my small fixes through my phone (thank God for my droid). When it was necessary for me to get online, I headed to Starbucks where I decided that America’s somewhat new fascination with over-priced coffee is probably synonymous with WiFi.

So, what have I been doing with my time? Remember, I was also out my 250 cable channels, DVR and OnDemand. That’s right, unplugged. Well, I re-discovered my love of the Sims games and wanted to write a huge blog about being able to create your own world and play “God.” But, I failed to ever get that idea from my head to my laptop and eventually got bored watching my Sim character watch tv and use his computer. (jackass.)

I then turned to the Wii for fun, but I don’t really have money to buy new games and there’s only so many times one can go virtual bowling before the novelty not only wears off but becomes completely annoying, and oddly enough, physically strenuous. I wanted to post a blog about the timeline of video games from my childhood to now. How did we go from Pong to Call of Duty so fast and what the hell kind of games will there be in another 20 years?! Again, I failed to get that idea from my head to my laptop.

I tried reading but there are too many books in my house thanks to my lit-nerd husband and I can’t seem to stay focused on a novel long enough before starting a new book and then I get my story lines crossed and then I get a headache because in this day and age, humans are not meant to read anything more than a blog or magazine article at a time. [Run-on or not, that sentence was fun to write and illustrates my point of rapid thinking and it’s connection to the dumbification of America.] (crap, I did it again)

I did all of those new mom things like changed diapers and folded tiny clothes, and thought about my how-to mommy hood blog that I would write and save lives with somehow. I watched a lot of movies from my Netflix queue and decided I wanted to start a movie review blog dedicated solely to B-Movies (I’m sure that’s never been done before *sarcasm is key*).

So, What have I been doing with my time? Thinking about blogging. How can I get people to read my blog? What is interesting to other people? Why do I even write a blog (three blogs, actually)? When will I finally feel great about a blog that I’m writing? Who reads these blogs anyway? Why does the word “blog” sound so funny after you say it ten times?

I’ve always been a fan of observational stand up comedy and feel like my blog is a good way for me to express that without the risk of rejection, or worse than that, silence. I’m constantly trying to find humor in everything I do just so I can write a long-winded diatribe full of run-on sentences (and too many parentheses [and punctuation marks!!]). Am I succeeding? No, not really. Do I feel good about the things I post? Yeah, mostly. Is there a line between a rant and art? Yes. Have I crossed it? Who knows. Aren’t I awesome at answering my own questions? I sure am.

To quote the timeless classic (and one of my favorite movies of all time) Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back:
“The internet is a place where nerds and geeks go to bitch about movies and share pornography with one another. It has given everyone in America a voice and apparently everyone in America has chosen to use it.”

Ben Affleck was speaking the truth, no doubt. Because everyone in America (and most of the world) has this new voice, it is used by most people; therefore, drowning out one another making every voice tiny and barely recognizable. Does that make the original voice worth having? Every shit head teenager has a webcam and a YouTube channel dedicated to their favorite guy-liner wearing pop-punk band’s deep and meaningful lyrics that totally describe exactly how they’re feeling. And every headstrong 20-something that knows everything has a sarcastic blog, full of run-on sentences, and, of course, too many punctuation marks (and parentheses).


(!?.!?.!?.!?.!?.)

Advertisements Gone Wild

I'm a fan of free stuff. Who isn't?

A few weeks ago, my dad came to visit and meet his new grand daughter. He didn't want to miss anything while he was here, so there was always a camera pointed at her (she's used to it). He would switch back and fourth between his still camera and his new handy little camcorder. Knowing that he was ungodly poor, I asked about the camcorder and learned that he had "won" it from marlboro.com.

Hm. They're killing him, but at least they're giving him free stuff!

Because I learned everything I know from my parents, I too smoke the Marlboro brand. Cowboy killers (good thing I'm not a cowboy). Delicious.

So, with my next pack, I took the promo code off the insert and went over to marlboro.com to get all my free stuff! My dad, so far, has gotten a Weber grill, a poker chip set, a deck of cards, a camcorder and a leather key chain. (All good things to have, especially if they're free)

I have an iron bottle opener headed my way. Its no camcorder, but it's a start.

While on marlboro.com, I saw an advertisement. It wasn't a "commercial" because cigarette companies are no longer allowed to advertise on TV or in magazines.

In this commercial (that I was unable to embed due to copyright issues) you see a group of executives sitting around a conference table. One of the guys leaves the table to go outside to have a delicious cigarette (he's not a cowboy either). While he is gone, the CEO comes in and tells the other employees about their "annual trip to the Bahamas," but that one of them must stay behind to "hold down the fort." Of course, the rest of the group volunteers the guy that is outside smoking revealing the moral of the story: Don't ever miss a moment, use Marlboro Snus instead of smoking cigarettes when you're at work. This commercial advertisement made me angry.

First of all, if you're about to start a meeting, you don't go take a smoke break. You would have taken this break a good 20 minutes before said meeting, allowing you time to get outside and back in with 10 minutes to spare. Second, you should be able to smoke at your conference table to begin with! Now, obviously, companies don't just send people to the Bahamas and even if they did, they wouldn't leave a fellow upper-management guy behind. They'd have middle management take care of it.

At the end of the commercial advertisement, you see the smoker outside of the office building enjoying his delicious cowboy-killing cigarette a comfortable 20 feet away from the entrance of the building. He takes in a long, beautiful drag and while he exhales he says "wow, the sun feels great."

Even though he has missed out on a meeting and has been denied a trip to the Bahamas, they still have to show that he is, in fact, enjoying that cigarette.

Queue the slogan "Never miss a thing" and the vocal equivalent of fine print: "this product may cause mouth cancer."

Yum.