Tag Archives: Brian Yuzna

‘The Dentist’ Brings Oral Hygiene Nightmares To Life

At first glance, The Dentist seems a run-of-the-mill, low-budget psychological horror film that does what it says on the tin. Yet under Brian Yuzna’s skillful direction and a talented cast and crew, the movie transcends its genre constraints. While delivering middling slasher thrills, Yuzna explores the darker aspects of the American Dream, creating an intriguing narrative exploring its inevitable pitfalls. 

In the lead, Corbin Bernsen — fresh from a lengthy and critically acclaimed stint on television’s LA Law — delivers a compelling performance as Dr. Alan Feinstone, a successful and fastidious oral hygienist. However, as the story unfolds, Feinstone’s seemingly flawless life unravels, revealing the truth behind the glossy façade of his Los Angeles reality.

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Dr. Feinstone has everything: a beautiful blonde wife, a luxurious modern home, a thriving business, and a taste for high-end clothing and cars. Yet beneath this veneer of material wealth and success, Alan is clearly an unhappy bunny. The good doctor tells of his internal turmoil during a voice-over in the opening five minutes. “I had a beautiful wife,” he explains. “I had a beautiful home. We had a perfect life together. But underneath that clean, white surface, there was the stench of decay.” Here lays the film’s central premise. In the relentless pursuit and preservation of success and perfection, the underlying challenges and sacrifices are minimized or dismissed. As the pressures to excel mount and the drive for perfection intensifies, Feinstone’s descent into psychosis unfolds, culminating in acts of violence reminiscent of Michael Douglas’ character in Falling Down

As Dr. Feinstone unleashes violence upon those in his private and public spheres, these characters’ symbolic roles offer incisive critiques of established norms. For instance, his wife (Linda Hoffman) engages in a steamy affair with the pool man (Michael Stadvec), the local lothario for other disillusioned housewives. Within the professional realm, an intrusive assistant (Molly Hagan) challenges not only his ethics and expertise but also his management style. The narrative goes on to extend its scrutiny to the state’s authority. This plays out through the avaricious Inland Revenue Service auditor (Earl Boen), who will ignore accounting discrepancies in exchange for personal gains — including complimentary dental services.

Predictably, each of these four characters meets their demise at the hands of the doctor. While Hagan and Stadvec suffer relatively routine deaths — strangulation and slashing, respectively — the wife and taxman meet impressively gruesome downfalls. In these moments, The Dentist deserves contemporary classic consideration, as the escalating gore quota will appeal to those with a penchant for the visceral. In permanently disfiguring these characters, Dr. Feinstone employs an impressive array of dental instruments, which will leave viewers wary of the next dental surgery visit.  

Corbin Bernsen delivers one of his standout performances, portraying a man teetering on the brink of reality with depth and skill. Yet, the film’s mastery lies in effectively communicating Feinstone’s unraveling psyche through the symbiotic interplay of sound and camera. Director Brian Yuzna — known for his contributions to the horror genre with films like Society, Bride of Re-Animator, Return of the Living Dead III, and Progeny — demonstrates his expertise by assembling a production crew rich in genre experience. Cinematographer Levie Isaacks, following his work on Leprechaun and Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation, captures with aplomb Dr. Feinstone’s descent into madness. The strategic use of tilting and spinning cameras, often ascending or descending, visually reflects this increasing instability. Adding another layer to the film’s atmosphere, composer Alan Howarth — credited with scoring close to sixty films, including the Halloween franchise (excluding the first John Carpenter film) — contributes a unique, unsettling electronic score. 

Rounding out the experienced crew, we must acknowledge the longstanding collaborative relationship between director Brian Yuzna and principal writers here, Stuart Gordon and Dennis Paoli, known for their work on Re-Animator and From Beyond. Contributing to this cinematic alchemy, the special effects team, including Kevin Yagher, Christopher Nelson, and Anthony C. Ferrante, materializes the macabre in unsettling and captivating ways. For those eagle-eyed star watchers, Mark Ruffalo, in an early film role, graces the screen with a brief cameo as a sleazy model agent. Remarkably, despite the caliber of talent assembled, production stayed within a budget of just $700,000.

While The Dentist offers several arresting uses of film form and poignant critiques toward the pursuit of success, it plays to type in important respects. We see this most notably in the camera’s overt objectification of the female form. The lens often fetishizes several of the principal female characters. April Reign (Christa Sauls) is an aspiring model whose mouth “is the only part of me [her manager] hasn’t totally rebuilt.” Sarah Andrews (Virginya Keehne) is a young teen desperate to remove her braces, which will, swan-like, propel her into womanhood. Although these characters survive Dr. Feinstone’s attacks, the camera lingers with intent upon their flesh. This is especially obvious with April, as she lies comatose, being undressed by the doctor, in the mistaken belief she is his wife. However, it is with Feinstone’s wife, Brook (Linda Hoffman), that the male gaze reaches its zenith. She is the sole character seen nude on multiple occasions. In a protracted scene lasting approximately two minutes, the camera focuses on her shapely, stockinged legs wandering the dental surgery, seeking her husband in the prelude to a gruesome attack. 

Amidst these portrayals, issues arise with representing the sole character of color. Ken Foree assumes the role of Detective Gibbs, but unfortunately, this police officer lacks believability. Despite extensive acting credits — including a memorable performance in George A. Romero’s Dawn of the Dead Foree delivers an inept investigator in The Dentist. One that engages in questionable actions at crime scenes, such as touching evidence and consuming contents from unidentified jars without concern for contamination or consequence. These depictions of race and gender raise valid concerns about how the film reinforces clichés and stereotypical roles for women and actors of color.

The Dentist is an important film that reminds us of the horrors in the everyday. Yuzna depicts the fears and anxieties associated with visiting commonly taken-for-granted institutions and explores the consequences of striving for an idealized existence that ignores the inevitable struggles accompanying such aspirations. The cinematography and soundtrack complement the mood of the film perfectly, but it is the film’s social commentary — even factoring in its racial shortcomings — that elevates it beyond conventional horror fare.

The Shakespearean Romance of ‘Return of the Living Dead III’

According to the history books, the first performance of William Shakespeare’s The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet was in 1597. Since then, the story has been retold countless times, but none bloodier than Return of the Living Dead III. Though viewed by many as a camp zombie movie romp, there is a lot of heart hidden within. In fact, Return of the Living Dead III is arguably one of the most romantic stories in horror. Furthermore, Brian Yuzna’s 1993 film is one of the best reinterpretations of Shakespeare’s work. 

When thinking about Return of the Living Dead III, romance will be the furthest thing from most viewers’ minds, and yet there is no denying that it is a love story. Written by John Penney, the third film in the Return of the Living Dead series focuses on couple Curt (J. Trevor Edmund) and Julie (Melinda Clarke). Return of the Living Dead III follows the sweethearts as they find their love tested when Julie develops a newfound hunger, one only sated by human flesh (and preferably brains). It is an emotional rollercoaster, and like Romeo and Juliet, there is no happy outcome for the pair. 

Whilst Curt and Julie are not enemies like the Montagues and Capulets, there remains hostility around the couple. This is brought on not by warring families or blood feuds but by class divides. Julie is introduced first, partying with friends on the beach. Like them, she is clad in a leather jacket and alternative punk-rock clothing. Her appearance immediately screams anti-establishment – and perhaps a little financially challenged. As Curt arrives atop his motorcycle, Julie’s friend Mindy pokes fun at him, referring to him as “The Lone Ranger.” She clearly views him as something of a joke and rolls her eyes as Julie leaves with him. 

While Julie’s friends tolerate Curt, Curt’s father, Colonel John Reynolds (Kent McCord), views Julie as inferior. She is the girl from the wrong side of the tracks, her station making her lesser in his eyes. As a Colonel, he is able to provide his family with a comfortable middle-class existence, and he views Julie as someone who will drag his son down to her basic level. His thoughts are made clear when he finds Curt and Julie alone in his house. Without even acknowledging Julie, he demands to speak with Curt. As he shares the news of their imminent relocation, his true feelings are revealed with a dig at Julie – “getting you away from that girl would be the best thing that ever happened to you!”

At odds with his dad, Curt dotes on Julie. But it is his willingness to please her that ultimately seals their fate. Julie is the one that pushes for them to sneak into Colonel Reynolds’ military facility. Curt reluctantly agrees but is far more nervous than Julie. Her behavior is that of a giddy and excitable child. Even when faced with a dead body, Julie is almost gleeful. Meanwhile, Curt is uncomfortable and repulsed. The two contrasting reactions compound their differences, infusing them with an odd-couple quality. This only makes them more endearing – love, it seems, conquers all.

It is their intense lust for one another that is their undoing. Julie’s inability to keep her hands off Curt causes a fatal collision that leaves her dead. In Romeo and Juliet, when Romeo returns from exile and sees Juliet ‘dead’, he believes that is her end. Romeo’s only option is to join his bride. Here, Curt has the upper hand over his Montague counterpart and opts to resurrect Julie with a little Trioxin – the military’s experimental reanimation drug.

Reanimating a loved one is one of the oldest tricks in the genre handbook, and here Curt follows the footsteps of the infamous Louis Creed. Over the course of Pet Sematary, Louis ‘brings back’ his family pet, toddler, and wife. Unfortunately, they came back ‘changed,’ and Curt eventually realizes that Julie has returned not entirely whole. Unlike in Pet Sematary – where Church, Gage and Rachel Creed’s returns are immediately signposted as different and dangerous – it takes longer for Julie to reveal her new tastes. Whilst all the other subjects to be experimented on with Trioxin have been mindless monsters, Julie has retained at least a shard of her humanity. Her bond with Curt is used to explain the phenomena as Colonel Reynolds is told, “It seems that his girlfriend has been brought back completely intact. And obviously, there was a very strong connection between them.”

They say that love is blind, but Return of the Living Dead III pushes that statement to the limit. Julie’s changes include a hunger for human flesh, a behavior that does not faze Curt. As Julie attacks a gang member and quickly consumes the brains of a shop owner, Curt appears only mildly concerned and distressed. Julie’s new fondness for self-harm also fails to register for Curt. People often overlook red flags in relationships, but a loved one feasting on others should be harder to ignore. Curt remains in denial and interacts with Julie exactly as before, right down to consummating their new union. The only wavering demonstrated by Curt comes after Julie is discovered eating Riverman (Basil Wallace). 

Just as Romeo and Juliet had Friar Lawrence, Julie and Curt have Riverman there to help them. In Romeo & Juliet, the Friar helps the young couple get married and sets in motion the plan for them to be together. Although Riverman is less hands-on with Curt and Julie in that regard, he does undertake the role of a guardian angel. He shelters the pair when they flee and later puts his life on the line for them. Even in the agony of waking death during the film’s climax, Riverman is there to assist the pair one last time. 

Sadly, like Shakespeare’s star-crossed lovers, Curt and Julie meet a tragic fate. Colonel Reynolds eventually captures Julie, and the pair is again wrenched apart. An undefined amount of time later, Curt is granted permission to see Julie again. The Julie he is confronted with is a shadow of her former self. Her punk-rock spirit is lost, and she is seen cowering in a cell. Her behavior continues to be in stark contrast to the other experiments, who manically move around their confinements, screaming. As well as proving her to be more ‘civilized,’ Julie’s withdrawn demeanor can be likened to suffering from a broken heart. The image saddens Curt and reveals his own heartache, teasing that their love story is not over yet. 

Unlike some others who fall in love with a monster, Curt refuses to leave Julie behind. When he hears the fate that awaits her – life as a biomechanical weapon – he cannot abide it. Once more, Curt races to Julie’s rescue, but this time their luck has run out. Although Curt breaks Julie out, amid the chaos of a full facility breach, he is bitten himself. Realizing his fate, Curt escorts Julie to the furnace. 

Unable to exist in a world that doesn’t understand their love, they, like Romeo and Juliet, decide to take their own lives. They step hand-in-hand into the furnace. As the flames rise and the inferno absorbs them, they kiss and cling to one another. The final haunting image of Return of the Living Dead III is that of the two perishing in an eternal lover’s embrace. This bittersweet end sobers the legacy of the series and proves that love always endures.