Of all the mythical childhood icons, the Tooth Fairy is the hardest to pin down visually. Bunnies are easy enough to visualize, and Santa has pretty much every retailer in the Western Hemisphere working as his PR agent. As a child I would visualize the Tooth Fairy as a variation on the Disney rendition of Peter Pan's Tinkerbell. The restraining order I received from Disney's legal department put a stop to that, effectively bringing my childhood to an end at the tender age of thirty-seven. To realign my visualization of the Tooth Fairy, the Disney folks sent along an eight by ten of Bea Arthur in a leotard, tutu, and wings. I have not been quite right since.
The Tooth Fairy we meet in this film is quite a different take on the character. More of a witch than a fairy, she's riddled with tumors and murders children. Try to take that away from me, Disney!
Peter Campbell (Lochlyn Munroe) is fixing up an old country home into a bed and breakfast with the aid of hunky young handyman Bobby (Jesse Hutch). Peter's former 
fiance Darcy (Chandra West) and her daughter Pamela (Nicole Munoz) come to visit for the weekend. Pamela makes friends with a little girl named Emma (Jianna Ballard) that no one else can see.
Emma warns Pamela about the evil witch that used to live in the house and was known for taking the local children's last baby tooth and delivering gory lawn and garden tool death in return. She places the children's teeth in her magic music box, condemning their souls to wander the earth. After a spill on her bicycle, Pamela loses her last baby tooth and becomes a target for the witch.
The Tooth Fairy doesn't seem quite as selective as the legend would lead folks to believe. She starts whacking characters left and right — starting with Bobby who telegraphs his own demise when he says he can get that old wood chipper working again — then working her way through the cast. Genre vet P.J. Soles plays Mrs. MacDonald the next door neighbor who gives Peter and Darcy the secret to defeating the witch, and Peter's freeloading rock star wannabe pal Cole is played by Steve Bacic who played the pre-blue-furred Hank McCoy in X2.
.jpg?t=20120527181101)
Article comments
1 - Iloz Zoc
Matt,
Thank you, thank you for reviewing this one. I tried to watch it three times, but never finished it. What an uneven mess.
And you are right on the mark about that near-rape scene. My exact words were WTF! when she tells her dim bulb of a hubby about it, and he, and she, sort of let it slide out of the script.
I'd be gunning for the b*stards. But this scene points to much missing logic to character actions in this film.
The warning from the next door neighbor is hilariously badly acted and accented.
The gore scenes seem to be tossed in for no other reason than to boost the rating, too.
2 - Matt
Always glad to be able to take one for the team.:)
Anchor Bay is really losing face with releases like this. I came to know them as a company that released some seriously cool older films, which they still do (Cemetery Man and The Quiet Earth come to mind), but I've yet to see one of their direct to DVD releases that was worth watching.
3 - Iloz Zoc
You're a better man than I am: I say 'duck!' all the time.
I enjoyed Cemetery Man and The Garden was not too bad, just slow-paced (helped alot by having Lance Henriksen).
But this is just poor filmmaking. And when you consider that the director for The Garden laments The Garden wasn't the film he wanted to make in his commentary, you've got to wonder where this Stephen Cannell series is going.