Night Teeth Review: Style Over Substance
If you’ve ever spent a decent amount of time in Los Angeles, you’ve likely noticed car services buzzing in and out of traffic around you. They blend in at first, but soon the ID numbers stamped across front or back bumpers stand out, and you realize that Hollywood’s elite are passengers next to you.
On Night Teeth, we get a glimpse behind the tinted windows and at the passengers in question. They just turn out to be a pair of young female vampires on a mission before sunrise.
Now, let me preface this by saying if you were hoping to see Megan Fox and Sydney Sweeney as two badass vamp queens, this movie is not for you. While the duo is indeed in this film, they have maybe 10 minutes of screen time and are just one short chapter in this story.
The main body of work is focused on an unlikely trio: Benny, Blaire, and Zoe. Benny’s a clout-hungry wannabe DJ, tasked with driving a car service around in lieu of his older brother, Jay. Zoe and Blaire are the two passengers he’s chauffering around LA from sunset to sunrise.
While the trio is certainly attractive, charismatic, and they have great chemistry acting together, it’s hard to get past how blasé the performance is. But don’t get me wrong, sometimes it works. There’s something magnetic about Blaire (Debby Ryan) and Zoe (Lucy Fry), even when their main personality is “high-school mean girl.”
It’s palpable when Benny (Jorge Lendeborg Jr.) is on the outside looking in. As the audience, we’re just as drawn in by these two young women as Benny is, trying to figure out what their deal is. However, once their secret is revealed and Benny loses it, unfortunately, it just doesn’t translate through the screen.
Never once do the two young vampires feel dangerous, nor does Victor (Alfie Allen), though he’s really the film’s “big bad.” Maybe Night Teeth would have been better served with more gore to match the film’s sultry aesthetic.
The one major action scene towards the end of the film that actually focuses on the vampires and their abilities comes a little too late, though it does pick up the pace of the film in its denouement. If we had been given more of that from the beginning, it would have been much more engaging.
Speaking of aesthetics, visually Night Teeth is stunning. The neon lighting everywhere from the inside of their car service to the motel the trio ends the night at illuminates each frame in a fever dream of colors, romanticizing the dead of night in the City of Angeles.
The costumes are also perfect for modern vamps. Zoe and Blaire’s looks are definite GNO material, whereas Grace (Fox) and Eva (Sweeney) are dressed to kill in stunning gowns/capes and ear cuffs. They’re exactly how I would picture sexy girl boss vampires living in 2020s LA.
For all the glamour and glitz, there’s very little meat at the inside of this story. Night Teeth doesn’t give enough exposition to make you care about why any of the night’s events are taking place.
The film criminally underused some of its bigger named stars. From Fox and Sweeney, whose backstories are intriguing enough to warrant their own sequel/prequel to Alexandar Ludwig’s Rocko, a stoner vamp that seemed to have history with Zoe, Night Teeth has so much untapped potential.
For what it’s worth, these characters are interesting. There’s something very alluring about vampires in pop culture, and the way they create pseudo-families though they’re usually unrelated — even more interesting when they start to betray each other.
That’s why Night Teeth would have been better off as a series or even as the sequel to a different movie.
If the film had gotten us invested in all of the characters that had to be “defeated” in Victor’s quest for power, rather than giving them 5 minutes for a few quippy retorts in between driving scenes, there would have been a greater payoff.
It’s entirely possible for another film to come out of this universe pending performance. Netflix is known for expanding on their own IP, and there could be an anthology of films borne from the Night Teeth Universe.
This was just maybe not the one to start with.
Stay Thoughts:
- Did Megan Fox just have an abnormally obvious fang mouthpiece, or was she just the only one that had difficulty speaking with them in?
- Speaking of fangs, why were they so obvious on some vamps instead of others?
- I don’t care how many vampire movies I’ve seen, I still don’t get why some bites lead to “turning” and some lead to death
- Was Alfie Allen’s Victor some kind of super-vamp or can they all re-heal their brains like that?
- Since when do they EAT humans instead of just drinking blood?
- Is Benny just going to be a nocturnal student now? Doesn’t seem like that would work out.
Have Night Teeth on your October/Halloween watchlist? Let us know what you thought of it. Share your thoughts in the comments below!
Critic Rating:
User Rating:
Night Teeth is now streaming on Netflix.
Follow us on Twitter and on 
Instagram!
Want more from Tell-Tale TV? Subscribe to our newsletter here!
Marissa Crenwelge
Marissa is an avid pop-culture enthusiast and "daylights" as a digital marketing manager for sports and entertainment brands. When she's not writing or watching new TV and movies, Marissa enjoys spending time with her Australian Shepard, Luna, and spending too much money online shopping. Find her on Twitter at @marissacrenwlge