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MINI'S FIRST TIME
Directed & Written by: Nick Guthe.
Produced by: Kevin Spacey, Dana Brunetti, Edward Bass & Evan Astrowsky.
Director of Photography: Dan Stoloff.
Edited by: Michael Ruscio & Alan Cody.
Music by: Cato.
Released by: First Independent Pictures.
Country of Origin: USA. 91 min. Rated: R.
With: Nikki Reed, Alec Baldwin, Luke Wilson, Carrie-Anne Moss, Rick Fox, Svetlana Metkina & Jeff Goldblum.

When Diane (Carrie-Anne Moss) realized that the producer she was screwing (for a role on his hit series Bikini Girls) had also impregnated her, she rose to the occasion and accepted that she would have to suffer a lifetime of illegitimate-child support from the wealthy tycoon. What a martyr. Several years later, Diane’s daughter Mini (Nikki Reed) is finding teenage life to be duller than she had anticipated. Her curious way of coping with this fact of Beverly Hills life is to view every day as an opportunity to have another “first,” such as working as a prostitute and sleeping with her lecherous stepfather.

The worst part of this film is its obvious belief that it is uniquely honest. Mini’s opening voiceover is little more than a stale powerPoint presentation of stories meant to shock us that a Los Angeles teen would ever think about sucking down anything other than a frappuccino. As first-time writer/director Nick Guthe explains in his press notes, Mini arose from his “frustration with watching a string of movies about the teenage experience in America that did not resemble any high school or teenagers [he] had ever known.” Clearly, that string of movies did not include Kids, Welcome to the Dollhouse, Wild Things, American Beauty, Lolita, Crush, Heathers, Bully, The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things, or even his lead actress’ first film role in 2003’s Thirteen.

Of all those films, it mostly resembles Wild Things in its out-and-out ridiculousness. Mini's oversexed machinations are so overstated and her stepfather Martin (Alec Baldwin) is so gullible that their campy relationship somewhat redeems the film. The Mommie Dearest scenes with Diane are particularly fun, allowing Moss to be a slender Joan Crawford swimming in alcohol as Mini gaslights her mother into a pitiable downfall.

But this is by no means a serious film commenting on the state of American teenagers, much less an original one. Mini is the combined total of every Lolita character that has schemed and seduced her way across the silver screen from the past 40 years, no matter how many flickers of self-awareness Reed plants on her face. Zachary Jones
July 14, 2006