A Tooth Fairy Tale Review: Animated Adventure with a Touch of Kid-Appropriate Preteen Romance
Throughout this cartoon adventure aimed at tweens, the fairy community is dedicated to gathering teeth from sleeping children and placing treasure beneath where they sleep. Board-riding youthful nonconformist fairy Van (brought to life by Booboo Stewart) shows little enthusiasm about devoting his life to collecting baby teeth—a sentiment that’s entirely reasonable. He’s only slightly more curious about the financial workings behind it all: the fairies hand over the molars to unseen goblins, who provide metal in exchange. But Van’s curiosity is piqued when he spots a goblin (played by Larkin Bell), who proves to be far from the ugly creature he had imagined.
A Forbidden Connection and Common Enemy
The stage is set for an adventure with a light sprinkling of young love (though it’s perfectly appropriate for younger kids). The fairy and goblin communities are separated from one another, and nothing fuels the excitement of secrecy to bring people together. The two species portrayed in the film are remarkably alike, yet both maintain prejudiced beliefs about the other. The fairies are supposed to be entitled sorts, given to taking anything they want, while the goblins are allegedly stupid, smelly, and backward, but are actually intelligent and technologically advanced.
Of course, such a setup requires a shared foe to join forces against, and that need is met in the form of a group of vicious spiders, with voices by Jon Lovitz and Fran Drescher. They make no secret with these guys: they want to eat the goblins and fairies, and they serve as fairly bloodthirsty, though not particularly skilled, villains.
Ideal Viewers and Final Thoughts
There aren’t all that many animated films aimed at the viewer group that is beginning to have early romances, but aren’t yet old enough for whatever 14-year-olds are watching instead of Twilight. Should your youngster falls into this age group, it probably won’t to be their next all-time fave, but it’s a decent choice.
A Tooth Fairy Tale releases in movie theaters in Scotland starting October 10 and across the United Kingdom from 24 October.
