3.5 stars (out of 5)
As drawn from Phoebe Gloeckner’s semi-autobiographical graphic novel, this first film as director by actress Marielle Heller is reminiscent of other ‘controversial’ dramas about teenage sexuality like Catherine Hardwicke’s Thirteen, with which it shares a similarly non-judgmental, anti-moralising, non-punishment edge.
In a still-hippie-ish San Francisco of 1976 we meet 15 year old Minnie (English actress Bel Powley, actually 23 this year and recently seen in A Royal Night Out), who announces that she’s just had sex for the first time and goes home to start privately recording a series of tapes to serve as a diary and/or confession. However, the big problem is that she shared this rite of passage with the 35-or-so Monroe (Alexander Skarsgård), and he’s the sometimes-live-in boyfriend of her librarian Mom Charlotte (Kristen Wiig), who thinks she’s seriously progressive and open-minded but, of course, probably isn’t quite that much.
Minnie (an aspiring comic artist who has imaginary part-animated conversations with underground artist Aline Kominsky aka Mrs Robert Crumb) somehow manages to keep the secret from Mom and her kid sister Gretel (Abby Wait) as she and Monroe get together often for more afternoon delight, and when he gets cold feet, she’s upset and horny enough to strike out and screw anyone she can, in the hope that the sex will stop the pain. Which it doesn’t, but what 15 year old knows that?
Featuring strong playing from Wiig (again revelling in the chance to play serious), Skarsgård (terrific as a bit of a wanker) and Christopher Meloni (another True Blood refugee as one of Mom’s former squeezes), this is nevertheless really all about Powley, who offers a bold performance that mixes rabid hormones, spiritual agonising, scary self-debasement and extreme teenage drama-queening.
I Wake Up Screening 