The Dentist

THE DENTIST is an uneven, but quite effective little horror comedy that tries (and succeeds) at easy audience manipulation! The universal fear of dental pain will be amplified after just one viewing of this gorefest!

Corbin Bernsen (he of L.A. LAW fame) isn't bad as Dr. Allen Feinstone, a wealthy dentist whose nympho wife is having an affair behind his back with the pool boy. He is obsessed with cleanness and despises "Decay" of all kinds, not just the molar variety, but of the human variety as well. His wife qualifies, and so do many of his obnoxious patients.

After discovering his wife's infidelity, he snaps and goes on a murderous rampage, sinking various dental instruments into victims gums, ripping out teeth with pliers and taking a dental drill to the tongue. The stand-out scene is when he crushes a woman's tooth with a drill in glorious close-up. You will cringe at all this, for sure, since the make-up FX are quite effective....but you will also find yourself laughing through most of the gore.

Since this is a biproduct of some of the twisted minds that brought us RE-ANIMATOR, the script and execution is not without touches of intentional humor. Good supporting cast, also. And terrific to see Ken Foree (Peter from DAWN OF THE DEAD) again, although he's wasted in a lame supporting role as a cop.

Score: 6 out of 10.

Director Brian Yuzna has had an uneven career in the horror genre, creating masterpieces such as "Return of the Living Dead 3" or "Bride of Re-Animator", but at the same time he has done awful movies such as "Faust: Love for the Damned" or the mediocre "Progeny". He is obviously better in the seat of Producer where his work producing Stuart Gordon's films has been superb.

"The Dentist", is one of his lesser works as director, but the low profile it has benefits the film and its lack of pretensions makes it a very enjoyable experience. It tells the story of Dr. Alan Feinstone (played superbly by Corbin Bernsen), a successful dentist who one day discovers that his perfect life is not really as perfect as he thought when he discovers that his beautiful wife (Linda Hoffman)has an affair with the pool boy. This event disturbs his mind and puts him in a killing spree as he takes revenge on the world for being so "filthy".

The premise is very well handled by Yuzna, as he takes us on a ride following Feinstone's day of revenge. What makes this movie different from most slashers is that we are not in the victim's perspective, we follow Feinstone because he is the main character. We witness how he goes from respected professional to psycho murder in a day. Yuzna manages to give the movie the exact amount of suspense but adds a good dose of dark humor that really helps the movie.

Most of the success of the premise is in Bernsen's performance as Feinstone. He can make you feel sympathy and hate towards him at the same time, and the subtle humor his character has is another aspect that aids the film. The rest of the cast is not as good, and I think that their sub par acting hurts the film more than it should. A notable exception is Ken Foree, as the detective trying to catch Feinstone. While his part is quite small, he makes a great job with it.

With a dentist as killer, gory scenes are expected, and Brian Yuzna delivers great SFX in the correct amount. It's good to see that he does not go over-the-top with it as he usually do, and I dare to say that this is a highlight of the film. It has the exact amount of gore that is expected, nothing less and nothing more. Yuzna restrained himself of his common excesses and the result is great.

While this is not among Yuzna's most well-known films, I would say that it is one of his best. Sure, it is not classic material as his masterpieces, but it is a movie that entertains and never gets tiresome or boring. It is a low-budget simple film, but for what it is, I think it rocked. 7/10

When I first heard of this movie, I naturally just wrote it off as one of those 'formula' scary movies... you know, find one thing that a lot of people are afraid of(spiders, heights, closed rooms... and, in this case, dentists). But it was actually better than I expected. I does have some genuine scares, and the mood of the film is thoroughly creepy and unpleasant. Even though I've never been afraid to go to the dentist, I found the torture scenes to be quite painful and sometimes even hard to sit through. In fact, I might have problems the next time I go to a check-up. The plot is surprisingly original and interesting. The pacing was good... I wasn't really bored during any part of the movie. The acting is where the movie fails to surpass the low expectations towards the movie... it is exactly as bad as you'd imagine, and sometimes worse. The characters are also kind of stereotypical... there is just about every single kind of nervous girl with dental problems that you can imagine. The script also has quite a few problems... suddenly, more and more people show up to see the dentist. And even though the first couple of patients come out crying and in various states of unpleasantness, the rest of them are still (somewhat) eager to get in the chair. I did like the slow descent into madness of the dentist, Dr. Feinstone. That was surprisingly good. Normally movies like this have little to no explanation of the killers motivation, but this one had a somewhat good one. The cinematography was kind of experimental, like the camera crew and/or the director of photography wasn't sure what angles they wanted, and just threw in anything they could think of. As a result, some of it looks good, and some of it looks very first-year-of-film-school. The gore effects range from good to mediocre. I could tell how many of the effects were done, but some of them had a good... uh... effect. There was relatively little gore, which came as a surprise... most of the scares are achieved through suggestion and the eerie mood of the film. I found it to be a nice diversity when the kills were done without dental equipment... this only happens a few times through the movie, but when it does, it's a good change of pace. The film has a few good qualities, and about as many poor qualities. However, the latter group can be ignored by being a little forthcoming and looking at the good, entertaining stuff in the film. There's a good amount of attractive girls in the film, and the scares are reasonably good. I recommend this to fans of B-movies, horror flicks and possibly of the director or one or more of the actors. I urge anyone who's scared of dentists to think twice about the film, though... it might turn them entirely off to dentists. Everyone else, consider watching this movie. It's surprisingly entertaining and not as bad as many claim it is. 6/10

I am never going to the dentist again unless I see his wife beforehand. If he has some delicious piece of candy like Linda Hoffman, I'll pass.

Corbin Bernsen played a demented dentist to perfection. he wasn't demented at the start, only after he caught his precious wife with Matt (Michael Stadvec) the pool boy.

Then he used his dental powers to torture his patients, and his wife, in revenge.

Really gory, especially if you don't like dentists anyway, and really hot when Linda Hoffman was on screen.

It was a fun experience.

I really enjoyed Yuzna's "Society," which I view as a rather clever send off to the 80s: A satire of sorts in which an outsider teen chases the unobtainable girl, engages with his wacky friends and confronts a family that is increasingly alien to him. The tropes were John Hughes; but the special effects were Stan Winston: straight out of the animatronics and puppet cabinet of that time. It was very clever (and rather gross!)

"The Dentist" is not that film. There is almost no social commentary; and frankly it plays rather straight forward: Corbin Bernsen's "Alan" is the titular main character who becomes unhinged when his trophy wife takes up with the pool boy. There is a pretense that Alan is obsessed with ridding the world of dirt and decay (get it?!) Thus his wife's actions set loose a screw that has long been barely secured inside of him. But that's pretty thin as plot devices go.

So, original? Certainly not. But the cast is wonderful, and the dark humor make it worth the watch (like "Society," this film includes some running gags and camera work that presage the likes of "Scrubs" and "Malcolm ITM." Look for "Sarah" and the IRS agent.)

So why is "The Dentist" listed in IMdb as straight horror? Got me. It is definitely horror-comedy as far as I am concerned. Yes, it is gory, but a great deal of that is centered on the good doctor lapsing into a psychological rage as he works. Anyone who has ever visited a dentist will cringe.