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Linda, this has been debated before but I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with a toothy smile as long as it looks spontaneous. No one can sustain a natural-looking closed mouth smile for very long either; it ends up looking forced and stiff, and that stiffness can spread to the expression of the eyes, as well.
The same argument you cited could be applied to many classical paintings, including Degas' ballet series. These, too, obviously captured a fraction of a second; no one maintains a ballet stance that long either. Brueghel's scenes also come to mind; again the artist attempted to capture complex activities and depict them as though they were frozen in time. And Eakins has a woman with her mouth open in song and a man in mid-leap at a swimming hole. Once you get away from the very formal studio portrait I think it comes down to preference: either the painter's or the client's.
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