[Film Review] Teeth (2007)

TW: Sexual assault and rape.

There’s no denying that Teeth (2007) is a movie whose reputation precedes it. Whether you have seen it or not, most horror fans have heard about the film that involves vagina dentata, or a vagina containing teeth. While the main content of Teeth may seem like a gimmick to make it stand out from the crowd, it turns out that Dawn (Jess Weixler) and her toothy vagina are here to make a much more important point rather than just making people with penises shrink away in fear. 

The skyline of Teeth is overshadowed by giant nuclear power plant towers that The Simpsons (1989) would be proud of. While it’s never directly addressed, it seems as though Dawn’s strange condition and the proximity of her house to the plant are likely to be connected. However, how Dawn ended up with teeth in her vagina is not the main point of this story. Instead, Teeth focuses on Dawn’s sexuality, her ownership over her body, her coming to terms with the changes that come with puberty and growing up, and the way the men in her life treat her. 

Teeth opens with a young Dawn sharing a paddling pool with her older step-brother, Brad (John Hensley). While the action happens out of sight of the audience, Brad appears to flash Dawn, before asking her to reciprocate. Soon, Brad cries out in pain, the tip of his finger bitten off by something unseen, an incident he is unwilling to share details of with his parents. 

Cut to years later, and Dawn is a member of a Christain abstinence group called The Promise. Along with her two best friends Alisha (Julia Garro) and Phil (Adam Wagner), Dawn frequently gives motivational talks to groups of young teens about the importance of saving yourself for marriage and not wasting your virginity on just anyone. However, things are soon complicated for Dawn when Tobey (Hale Appleman) joins both her friend gang and her abstinence group. The pair immediately strike up a friendship due to their shared Christain values, but there’s also a clear attraction between both parties. The friends seem to realise that having feelings for each other is a problematic part of growing up and try to actively block out those feelings in order to say ‘pure’. This leads to the group going to see a kids film at the cinema rather than a romance movie at the risk of being exposed to kissing while in the presence of the opposite sex.

One thing that Teeth does very well is it shows the confusion that hits you as a teenager when you have to deal with the rush of new feelings and emotions. In Dawn’s mind, she has decided that sex isn’t something that is important to her right now and that she will save herself for the person she chooses to marry. However, her hormones have different ideas, making her interactions with Tobey awkward. This isn’t something that Dawn hasn’t experienced before, but it’s something that most teenagers will recognise all too well.

Eventually, Dawn decides to explore her relationship with Tobey a little more, going on a trip to a local swimming hole with him, and risking stripping down to her swimwear in front of him. She soon becomes uncomfortable, trying to exit the water, and distance herself from Tobey. However, Tobey pushes things, ignoring Dawn’s requests, eventually knocking her unconscious and raping her. During the attack, Dawn’s vagina bites off Tobey’s penis, with Tobey falling into the water bleeding profusely. 

Tobey’s attack is the first of many that Dawn has to endure as the movie goes on, and it shows the various ways that men can take advantage of women, especially when they’re already vulnerable. Tobey uses Dawn’s confused feelings for him to push his own needs onto her, even when she makes it clear it’s not what she wants. Later scenes show her trying to seek medical help for her vagina dentata, and being abused because the doctor thinks her inexperience will allow him to do what he wants. Even scenes that start off as consensual sex turn into something very different to what Dawn agreed to. 

As the story progresses, Dawn starts to take more control of both her sexuality and the power that having teeth in her vagina gives her. She learns how to control the teeth, deciding when to use them and when not to. It’s fascinating to watch the change in her character, leading to her feeling more confident, and seeing her face-off against the men who seek to take advantage of her at every point possible. However, it’s also heartbreaking to see everything Dawn thought she knew ripped away from her. She’s framed her identity around being a ‘good girl’ and being part of the abstinence group, despite it causing her to be bullied by her classmates and her step-brother. When Tobey robs her of her perceived pureness, she cannot live the life she has mapped out for herself and instead has to adjust everything she thought she knew about sex, her desires, and her body.

Teeth is wonderfully wacky in places, there’s more than one close-up of a severed penis, and you will laugh at its black comedy moments (most of which are the aforementioned penis shots). But it’s also an incredibly important piece of cinema when it comes to addressing female sexuality that shouldn’t be disregarded simply because the plot sounds a bit ridiculous. Writer and director Mitchell Lichtenstein places the vagina front and centre in Teeth showing how powerful, confusing and complicated it can be to be a woman understanding her sexuality.

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