Written and Directed by Greg Mclean, 2007

Giant crocodile movies are a dime a dozen and for a simple reason; they’re easy.  The nature of the animal covers the majority of elements for you.  It can go on land and can vanish in the water.  Long rows of jagged teeth, scaly skin and a realistic reputation for larger than life sizes lets filmmakers get away with stretching the beast a few more giant feet.  Regardless of what your standards are, those elements are hard to fudge beyond redemption.

ROGUE is, as laws of probability would suspect, no exception.  Set in the beautiful riverscape of outback Australia, Greg Mclean sets his chompers on a tour boat filled with folk.  Boat captain Radha Mitchell takes a detour towards a distress flare when the giant reptile in question rams the boat, flooding it in the process.  Cappin’ takes emergency action and docks the boat on a dockless bit of island at the river’s bend.  It isn’t too long before one of the customers disappears off the island, which just so happens to be on a tidal river.  In due time night will fall, the tide will rise and the terra firma separating them from the inky black will disappear.

Written and Directed by Mitchell Lichtenstein, 2007

It took three years for the world over to generate a peer to Edgar Wright’s unassailable masterpiece SHAUN OF THE DEAD. The time is finally upon us and it is with a wave of relief that I am honored to declare a heroic cohort in the horror comedy realm; Mitchell Lichtenstein’s feature length directorial debut, TEETH. What Wright and Pegg did for zombies, Lichtenstein has done for creature features: toil within the rigid conventions of the genre in order to bestow upon the field an intimate humanity, a story bifurcated with implacable comedy and deeply personal terrors.

People tend to discount the circadian heart beats of horror at the core of SHAUN OF THE DEAD. I suppose this is because that British gold packs irresistible comedy. I fear the same fate will befall TEETH. The pitch Lichtenstein reaches is one of refined, timeless perfection.

Jess Weixler is a casting Godsend in her role of Dawn, the God loving virgin soul struck with a curse of such divine inspiration that anyone who sees the film will go to their grave remembering it. And yet such inspiration (which I can only hope out of professional jealousy percolated within Lichtenstein for years until it evolved into the unique beauty we were gifted with) will also be the film’s downfall with mainstream viewers. They will never appreciate how rare it is, for they will be too busy either giggling or squirming over Dawn’s extraordinary plight; Vagina Dentata.

Or, put less elegantly; Dawn has teeth in her vajayjay.