raison d’être for their
individual works, they seem largely to be aping convention in an effort solely
to land their next gig. If you think about it, this trend is in some ways
actually more craven than broadly pitched, mindless Hollywood
fare, which at least usually has the good sense and decency not to try to
present itself as thoughtful, and certainly not as art. All of which brings us
to Mini’s First Time, an empty
vehicle of flattened emotional affect from screenwriter and debut feature
director Nick Guthe.

Born — as its breathless over-narration more than adequately
informs us — to an embittered, gold-digging mother (Carrie-Anne Moss), teenaged
Mini (Thirteen’s Nikki Reed) lives
life in the Hollywood fast lane. Estranged from said
alcoholic, philandering mother, Diane, and her equally emotionally isolated
stepfather, executive publicist Martin (Alec Baldwin), Mini lives her life as a
mission to collect as many behavioral cherry pops — as many original
experiences — as possible. (Not to nitpick, but wouldn’t the more apt and
interesting title then be Mini’s First
Times, plural?) To that end, she takes a job at a high-end escort service,
and who should one of Mini’s first clients be except… Martin.

Instead of running nauseously from the room, however, Mini
rationalizes that it’s OK since they’re not really related, and thus coaxes an
unaware Martin into a shadowy but satisfying sexual encounter. When he finds
out what’s happened, Martin is momentarily thrown, but — his reasoning perhaps
impaired by a loveless marriage — he pursues a continuation of their
relationship, and soon finds himself amenable to Mini’s suggestion that they
conspire to have Diane committed to a mental institution by eliciting further
outrageous and zonked-out behavior through meting out a combination of drugs,
alcohol and psychological intimidation. Mini eventually arouses the suspicion
(and possibly more) of her hornball television producer neighbor (Jeff
Goldblum), and this and other events lead to continuing inquiries from a dogged
beat cop (Luke Wilson).

Like similarly sour-cheeked adolescent tales of manipulation
and emotional disconnection Pretty Persuasion and The Chumscrubber, Mini’s First Time attempts to walk a
tightrope between sly, dark and/or tongue-in-cheek comedy and somewhat shadowy
menace, but comes across as smirky, contrived and unconvincing. Here the adult
characters are at least a bit less buffoonish and a bit more rooted in the real
world, if no less wholly irresponsible in their parental duties and adult
oversight. But while the character of Mini somewhat recalls, in her lack of
altruism and coldly intellectual honesty, Linda Fiorentino’s turn as Bridget
Gregory in director John Dahl masterful slice of ’90s noir, The Last Seduction, there’s neither the
shock nor the heft of that unapologetic opportunism here.

While dealing with his unlikable protagonist and having her
do nasty and scabrous things, Guthe also wants to imply that Mini acts the way
she does because she’s a wounded bird or somehow fighting for survival, even
though the film’s ludicrous ending realistically completely undercuts this
suggestion. From a purely practical and entertaining point-of-view, though,
there’s no palpable warmth to Martin and Mini’s relationship past the first
sexual bloom, so you know long in advance the two twists that are inevitably
coming. What one is left with is a triple-smug picture that enjoys flaunting
its “inappropriateness” and then trying to convince you that in doing so it’s
revealing some significant anthropological or sociological truths. I’m sure
someone will indulge these, Mini’s First’s
lies, but it won’t be mainstream audiences, or even most desirously agreeable
independent film fans. (First Independent, R, 91 mins.)