Movie Review: Mini's First Time

By Ron Wilkinson May 22, 2006, 12:27 GMT

The last film that was actually banned by local video stores out of shear, genuine fear for the community was Sofia Coppola’s 'The Virgin Suicides.'

In a left handed compliment to the cast and crew of the film, some store owners simply could not face the possibility that members of the teenage community might follow the leads of the characters in the film. They knew the chance was remote, but it was still there and they simply couldn’t chance it.

'Mini’s First Time' might be the next film to fall into that category.

The conceit of the central storyline and its execution by the first-rate cast are so funny and scary at the same time that some adults might take it to heart and ban the dang thing rather than risk the consequences.

Start with Nikki Reed (‘Lords of Dogtown’) who plays the part of the precocious high school senior Mini.  Ms. Reed is well cast in this part because she has smarts as well as looks, as evidenced by her Independent Spirit Award for Best Debut Performance for writing the screenplay for the film  ‘Thirteen’ in 2003.

She is sly and visceral; just innocent enough that we don’t ever really know if she is a devil or an angel.  She is the reincarnation of Lolita, only Lolita has a brand new bag.

Complementing Ms. Reed is the redoubtable Alec Baldwin playing her step father Martin and the husband of Mini’s dysfunctional, shrewish mother Diane (Carrie-Anne Moss).

Diana has long since abandoned any shred of marital fidelity to Martin in favor of the well-endowed masseuses at the local spa.

This casts Baldwin in the unlikely role of a wealthy and macho cuckold who is ripe for the disturbing ideas fermenting in Mini’s fertile brain. Most rewarded for his work in ‘Cooler’ in 2003, you may still remember Baldwin for his pugnacious performance in ‘Glengarry, Glen Ross’ (1992) that hit both cast and audience like a billy club in the gut.

Or his great comedic performance in ‘State and Main’ (2000) in which he is a star helplessly leching his way to the end of his career.

The great thing about this film is that it combines the shriveling stare and bulging body mass of “Cooler” and “Glengarry” with the flawed incontinence of ‘State and Main.’  The result is one performance that is as good as all of the others put together.

His combination with Nikki Reed is this film is pure chemistry. These two get off on each other on so many different levels that the power is like Chernobyl, spiraling out of control in directions we can only guess.

In the part of the abandoned but not divorced wife Diane, Carrie-Anne Moss (‘Snowcake,’ ‘The Matrix’ series, ‘Chocolat’) plays one of a group of isolated, rich wives looking for new ways to pass the time.

But they don’t find what they are looking for because life holds only so many different ways to cheat on a husband.  Having exhausted them all, the group is reduced to a state of permanent mutual self-loathing in the search of the living death of the truly forgotten.

Mini is the daughter of Diane and Diane’s wealthy producer-partner-former-lover who, as Mini reports, decided that twenty one years of child support was better than marriage to mom herself.

Undoubtedly a wise decision and one Martin regrets he didn’t make.

Rounding out the central cast is John Garson (Luke Wilson—‘The Family Stone,’ ‘The Royal Tenenbaums,’ ‘Rushmore,’ ‘Bottle Rocket’).  John is called in mainly as Martin’s conscience and shares this role with that of next door neighbor Jeff Goldblum. Both perform admirably within the limited requirement of their parts as Martin begins to buckle under the weighty demands of the life Mini has set out for him. 

Bringing to mind such performances as Sue Lyon in Kubrick’s 1962 ‘Lolita’ (of course) and Nicole Kidman in Gus Van Sant’s 1995 ‘To Die For,’ Nikki Reed has made a smash entry into breakthrough artist territory.

The only thing that stands in the way of major kudos for her performance is the extremely controversial nature of Nick Guthe’s screenplay. These DVDs will either be prized or burned and nobody will be able to predict which outcome will come to pass.

The only thing of which we can be sure is that audiences with the guts to sit through the film will be entertained.