ORAL FIXATION

“Finding a good dentist can be hard…making him love you can be murder.”

Rachel Marks is the type of girl who makes most men wish (just for a moment) that they had a psychopathic, sadomasochistic, knife-wielding femme fatale for a stalker. She’s beautiful, blond, buxom, vivacious, spunky, sexy, happy, and always smiling. On second thought, maybe most men would wish for this a few moments! Oh, did I mention that she also has a habit of being orally fixated on the object of her obsession? I guess that adds a few more moments! Wait! Before your mind gets spinning too much, let me clarify something! The oral fixation, in this case, is not what you’re thinking

As Oral Fixation begins, we see Rachel bouncing happily along in a tight-fitting, low-cut red shirt and a short blue skirt. The colors are beyond vibrant, almost as distracting as Rachel herself. On her face is a smile that seems as much an accessory as her clothes; it’s a plastered on, ear-to-ear grin that, on any normal person, would be fake…but, on Rachel, it’s real. For whatever crazy reasons, she’s as happy as can be going to a place most of us don’t enjoy—the dentist. “Why?” you ask. The reasons are just some of what makes a man happy he’s without such a stalker.

Rachel (Emily Parker) struggling to hold back her love for Dr. McNeil in Oral Fixation

Rachel (played by Emily Parker) is the excellent example of a demented damsel distressing others more than being distressed herself. Emily plays the part so well that it makes one wonder how similar she is to Rachel in life. Just kidding! I’m sure she’s not really a psycho, but, to Emily’s credit, she sure makes me think…again, just for a moment. Like a pro, Emily is able to make us wonder what’s beneath Rachel’s pensive smiles and giddy happiness. We suspect, seeing only her face, that what she’s thinking is the opposite of what her expressions suggest. “Bite me. Make me bleed,” is one of Rachel’s lines said more than once, with a smile. Before you think, “No way,” think again. Rachel is a woman who will do whatever it takes to get what she wants. When I say whatever, I don’t mean the normal “whatever.” I mean the absolutely, positively crazy-as-Hell “whatever.” We won’t even talk about what she does to make it look like she’s been raped.”

Yes! Teeth will be pulled!

Rachel visits Dr. McNeil’s office several times a week for a teeth cleaning, and damages her own teeth to create reasons for various tooth repairs and surgeries. Rachel lies in the dentist’s chair, with her mouth wide open, inviting every manner of dental tool inside. Her teeth are drilled, and her gums are poked, prodded, and cut, all without anesthesia—because, as she says, she’s allergic to it. Yeah, right! What’s more is that she takes all the pain looking like she’s having an orgasm. Yes, this girl is really screwed up!

“You really have changed. I can feel it in how you touch me.” ~ Rachel

Paul McNeil DDS is the unlucky object of Rachel’s dental desires. He’s a happily married man who seems not to notice the world around him, beyond his daily routine. His clean-cut good looks are more generic than name brand—Paul is as common as Rachel is different. Quite literally, as we’ll see, Paul’s type is more common than you’d think.

With the appearance of a detective (or is he really), we learn that Rachel’s father, Albert Tedeski, had tortured her for 20 years, using her as a test subject in his experiments. “Pain into pleasure” was his motto, and he had somehow switched things around on Rachel. Albert had made himself a stimulus, so that something about himself—his face, his voice, his scent—triggered something inside Rachel. This “something” could be obsession, yearning, rage, or…anything you can imagine. Sounds scary? It only gets worse!

Who could this be? What unexpected peril could he pose in a tale already so twisted?

Oral Fixation has more twists and turns than we see in more than a few other movies of its kind. What’s better is that nothing ever gets ridiculous, impossible, or unbelievable, no matter how far out on the limb it goes. We never feel like we’ve been cheated into watching a story that could never happen. Everything is plausible, in the most extreme of cases, making it all the scarier that it is. Just when you think you’ve figured it out, you haven’t.

Some reviews I’ve read have claimed that the plot is ridiculous. They’ve said that it could never happen, and, because of that, the movie loses lots of whatever they award movies—stars, hatchets, eyeballs, tomatoes, thumbs up, etc. To this, I say phooey! Just look at the headlines today! How many times has a current event become a proverbial stranger-than-fiction fact? Too many times for this reviewer to count, for sure! Could a woman mutilate herself in a plot to get the man of her demented dreams? Why not? A recent event involving a female astronaut driving 900 miles non-stop, wearing a diaper, to kill her romantic rival and friend sure sounds as strange as the plot in Oral Fixation. Another review I read claims that Paul McNeil’s wife, Molly, could have been less anxious to suspect that Paul was having an affair so—especially when, as they said, there was very little reason to suspect one anyway. Okay, let me get this straight. An attractive, large-breasted blonde calls a married man’s home and visits his office numerous times a week for petty reasons without complaint from the husband, and the wife doesn’t suspect an affair? Wait a minute! What planet are you living on? Men and women in real life accuse one another of such things with far less cause every day! Oh, and let me stress the phrase “with far less cause” one more time. Sometimes, we just expect characters in fiction to behave better than those in reality, and they don’t.

As for plot twists, Oral Fixation makes us wonder about more than a few things. Is Rachel Marks really Rachel Marks? Did she kill before? Or, was the killer the jealous brother-in-law of her former obsession? Is Detective Linford really Detective Linford…or, is he instead David Anderson, a killer himself? By now, I’m sure you get the idea. Oral Fixation has lots of mysteries, but, in the end, I’m happy to say that it solves them all. We are not left hanging like a loose tooth in the end. All of these questions are extracted most thoroughly, if not painfully.

As for gore, it mostly occurs in scenes showing what Rachel does to herself. What’s better (or worse) is that the scenes are prolonged, giving us time to think about how it feels. A scene where Rachel removes her own tooth with a tool that looks like a chisel is really hard to watch. I actually think it would take as long to really remove a tooth that way, and I squirmed a few times watching it. (Yes, even a veteran gorehound was affected!) We see the blood, we hear the crunching and cracking of the tooth, and we even hear sounds of pain coming from the one who enjoys it. Yes, it must be pretty bad, even for a masochist. Beware! Elsewhere, gore is limited but no less effective.

Alas! A break up with reality is a marriage of delusions.

As for special effects, they are as good as they need to be. The blood looks like blood, the tooth Rachel pulls from her mouth looks real, stabbings look real, and dead people look dead. Obviously, this movie is low on special effects, but it meets the needs it sets for itself. Whether from budgetary limits or not, the minimal effects are strong enough to do the job. I never found myself thinking anything didn’t look real enough.

The acting, although a little wooden at times from some characters, was done well enough. I only wondered how long it would take Paul McNeil (Kerry Aissa) to get really pissed off about what Rachel was doing. He seemed a little too calm at times, when I would be having a serious mental meltdown. It was as if he was having a few too many of those “moments” enjoying the attention of a good-looking, sexy, large-breasted woman (albeit here, a psycho bitch). In all fairness again, I guess you could say that’s exactly what he was doing. After all, Emily Parker does almost too well as she nails the role of the deranged damsel, too beautiful to resist…no matter what! The best performance, next to Emily’s, comes from Chris Kies (as Lindford Crouch). His portrayal of the private investigator was natural, convincing, and a standout in the movie. Aidan Sullivan did a passable job as Molly McNeil, the wife torn between worrying about her son, her marriage, her career, and not knowing who to trust. Her transition from a gullible woman worried about her career to a woman ready to do anything for revenge is believable. When kids get involved, we can expect an otherwise passive mom to do just about anything—even get a little psycho herself.

“Why has she been to your office six times in the last two weeks?” ~ Molly McNeil

Is Oral Fixation a perfect movie? Absolutely not! One possible issue involves the information the viewer receives about Rachel’s obsession, from the very beginning, through her own narration; it may have spoiled an opportunity for the development of tension by showing more of the process rather than the end result in the beginning. From the start, we know she’s obsessed, and it’s obvious that she’s insane. The viewer could have, perhaps, had a little more fun finding that out, over time, through actions rather than words. Whether this is a flaw or a simple missed opportunity is debatable, at best. While it didn’t bother me personally, it’s worth mentioning. Oral Fixation also has its obviously low budget working against it, mostly because so many people hold that against movies anyway.

Oral Fixation was written and directed by Jake Cashill and produced by Matthew J. Pellowski and Billy Mulligan of Lifesize Entertainment. The film was the winner of several awards—Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Director, and Best Cinematography—at the Long Island Film Expo in 2009. Often such advertised fanfare and award credits seem overblown and embellished, but not here. This seems a modest acknowledgement of a movie that stands out from the majority of Indie films in its league. Without such film festivals, where would so many lesser-known movies become known at all?

When your scorned lover looks like this, be afraid. Be very afraid!

Overall, I really enjoyed Oral Fixation. Yes, you read that right! I really enjoyed Oral Fixation—as a voyeur, that is. Based on reviews I read, I expected less… but I got a lot more. The story kept me guessing, the characters were interesting, and the gore, while restrained, did the job. Some scenes, keeping with the movie, acted like a sadist, making me, the viewer, feel the pain. Of course, since we’re talking about a horror film, that’s good news. Watching movies like Oral Fixation will remind you of just how normal your life really is—unless, of course, you happen to be a man who looks like someone I won’t mention here to avoid a spoiler! In that case, you may be the next obsession of one orally-fixated, blonde, attractive enough to make you vulnerable for the moment that could be your last! If you’re a woman, just make sure you’re not married to the man she wants!