Eliza Scanlen plays a terminally sick teenager who, after accepting that her future has an unfair expiration date, decides to live out one of her last days with her family at the beach.

No, this isn’t Greta Gerwig’s Little Women (where Scanlen has found herself in this exact scenario before). This is a tender moment from director Shannon Murphy’s quirky dramedy, Babyteeth.

This Australian-set, coming-of-age story centers around Milla (Scanlen), a single child to her self-medicating mother (Essie Davis) and therapist father (Ben Mendelsohn). After discovering that her cancer has returned, Milla embraces the You Only Live Once lifestyle by opening up and letting herself fall in love with the town’s local drug dealer, Moses (Toby Wallace). His tough-guy exterior doesn’t deter Milla from finding the softy inside, and together, Milla and Moses bring out the bold and beautiful in each other.

Babyteeth has an interesting editing cadence to it, reminiscent of a Greek Weird Wave dark comedy. It took me almost forty-five minutes to finally settle into the story, but once I did, I was hooked. The film is an exciting feature-length directorial debut from Shannon Murphy, assisted by strong performances from Ben Mendelsohn and Scanlen, who I hope is able to play a healthy leading lady soon!

The independent arthouse theatre, Arena Cinelounge, will be the first physical movie theater to open in Los Angeles and screen Babyteeth this Friday, June 19th. The film will also stream on VOD.