The Thin White Dude's Reviews - Tooth Fairy

See, have faith and your messiah will return. Shame about religion and all that other stuff that people use to understand a world that is indifferent to their plight. Speaking of make believe; remember Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny? Lies by our parents, creating mass disenfranchisement and repressed angst which traumatises us until our dying day, but hey, isn't it real if you can believe it's real? That is the principle of the understanding of the myth of the Tooth Fairy, in itself, completely nonsensical tosh. Right, basically this movie sees our Derek Thompson, played by Dwayne Johnson, a former major league hockey player, now playing in the minors, more famous now as "The Tooth Fairy" for his notoriety in smashing out people's teeth. Basically, Derek is a bit of a bitter, bad egg with a charming smile, who, after nearly exposing the "truth" regarding tooth fairies to his girlfriend’s daughter, is punished to two weeks of Tooth Fairy duty by the head of the tooth fairies. Now, to be fair, walking into this screening I was a bit grizzled and dishevelled, having gotten a horrible amount of shampoo in my eye and mouth, so this movie's chances weren't great. Then, after this, once I sit down after my long process of finding the "perfect" seat (I'm such a woman), the film plays, and NO SOUND. After complaining, the sound starts but the film doesn't. Brilliant. The film was meant to start at 14:15 but didn't start till after 14:30, which gave me fifteen minutes of twiddling my fingers and enduring the Strand Cinema's infamous zapping noise when they try to fix the sound. Ok, after this, the film starts, and to be fair, whilst I try to be the most unbiased critic I can be, we all have our preconceptions going into the film. Just looking at the poster of this movie began to twist my brain in negative ways, I mean, that is a terrible poster. And the tagline "The Tooth Hurts": are they trying not to make money, because money is the reason for its existence? As the movie continues, the sighs and groans are emerging from me like the equivalent of a human whoopee cushion or a 20-stone patron scoffing popcorns excessive wind, and to be honest, it is a bad movie. It would be a lazier script than Prince Of Persia, except that here there's nothing there to start with. The gags and one-liners that Johnson pulls early in the movie when he's a berk are nothing short of frighteningly embarrassing. This is a man who as The Rock in WWF/WWE came up with some of the funniest one-liners and gags in entertainment history, so surely he should be able to recognise the issues at hand, and Stephen Merchant, Billy Crystal and Seth McFarlane, each together some of the best living comedians, all signing up to this monstrosity of a script. It is so predictable and popcorn, you'd be forgiven for mistaking this is some post-modern satire/parody of the terribleness of this brand of movie, but it's not. So, to follow in the tradition of Roger Ebert: Lowell Ganz, SHAME, Babaloo Mandel, SHAME, Randi Mayem Singer, SHAME, Joshua Sternin, SHAME, Jeffrey Ventimilia, SHAME. Shame on writing such a horrible script. So yes, it is most certainly a bad movie and I recognise this, but you know what, I enjoyed that. Yes, that is no typo, quote me on the DVD or something I don't know, I enjoyed Tooth Fairy. What you say, I've just savaged the movie. As ever, I have a rebuttal. For some reason, despite all the terrible aspects of the film, for not only is the script horrible but it isn't a particularly well-made movie (did anyone else see the boom mike?), it was charming. Dwayne Johnson plays a berk who goes loveable in the end really well, and I'm not playing favourites here because I remember him as The Rock, but he is good in this role. The man literally sweats charm, and I feel that from the roles I have seen him in, which he generally does well, he has not been given the true vehicle that would cater to his talents. Also, it is great to see Stephen Merchant get a role where he is under the shadow of Ricky Gervais (ironic, being a "goggle-eyed freak", as the "little fat man" himself calls him), and the man is pretty loveable as Tracey, the slightly irritating fairy sidekick. Furthermore, and maybe this is a values thing, but the film is non-offensive fare. It might not change the fact that it is badly made and scribed, but for some reason director Michael Lembeck seems to milk as much charm as he can out what is effectively a dead cow. Is something wrong with me? I think there is, because I felt involved and very happy and felt good watching this film. Despite my entire being willing myself to hate this film, it was one of the transcendent moments where a film can somehow overcome its many flaws and become something much better than it is. It's certainly not in the so bad it is good territory, because it is rubbish, but I'd be lying if I said that I wasn't charmed by the film.

The Thin White Dude's Prognosis - 4.4/10

The Thin White Dude's Self-Diagnosis - Smiling

PS: Alternative poster's have the tagline as "You can't handle the tooth!" and "Magic is getting some muscle!". Just don't look at them, for your safety and sanity.