The Tooth Fairy Story Review: Cartoon Adventure with a Sprinkling of Kid-Appropriate Tween Love Story
Throughout this animated adventure aimed at tweens, the world of fairies focuses on gathering teeth from sleeping youngsters and leaving gold beneath where they sleep. Board-riding teenage rebel fairy Van (voiced by Booboo Stewart) shows little enthusiasm about devoting his life to gathering baby teeth—a feeling that’s completely understandable. He’s only a bit 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 catches sight of a goblin (voiced by Larkin Bell), who turns out to be far from the hideous gnome he had imagined.
An Unlikely Connection and Common Enemy
The stage is set for an adventure with a light sprinkling of young love (though it’s very much suitable for children). The goblin and fairy groups are separated from each other, and there’s nothing like the excitement of secrecy to bring people as one. Both groups portrayed in the film are incredibly similar, yet both maintain biased views about the opposite side. Fairies are said to be self-centered types, prone to stealing whatever they fancy, while the goblins are allegedly dim-witted, foul-smelling, and primitive, but are in fact intelligent and technologically advanced.
Of course, this scenario requires a common enemy to unite against, and this is duly provided by some nasty spiders, with voices by Jon Lovitz and Fran Drescher. There’s no beating about the bush with these guys: they aim to devour the goblins and fairies, and they serve as fairly bloodthirsty, though not especially competent, villains.
Target Audience and Overall Impression
There aren’t all that many animated films targeting the viewer group that is starting to experience early romances, but are not old enough for the content 14-year-olds are watching instead of popular teen sagas. Should your youngster is in the right age bracket, it probably won’t to be their next all-time fave, but you could do worse.
A Tooth Fairy Tale releases in Scottish cinemas from 10 October and the rest of the UK from 24 October.
