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New York Minute

Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen"¦ I know it's been a while since Full House.
If you're like me, you might have missed most of their home videos
including The Case of Sea World Adventure, The Case of Mystery Cruise,The Case of Fun House Mystery, and other riveting cases including but not limited to, The Hotel-who-done-it, Shark Encounter, U.S. Space Adventure and Volcano Mystery.

While everyone is shaking their heads at these titles with some
confusion, some of you are lying because they have accumulated a
billion dollar empire as a result of these videos and other stuff sold
at your local K-Mart. Now they've taken some of the money out of their
Scrooge McDuck money bin and invested it in a multi-million dollar
mainstream teen comedy-adventure.

For what it's worth, it did its job. New York Minute is a fast paced,
trendy film with a strong supporting cast that most children and
pre-adolescents will enjoy. Actually, it might even be safe to say that
if you're reading this review, you probably will have no control over
whether you go to this movie or not because either your kids will make
you or they won't. If you're going on your own power or you don't like
surprises, read on.

Mary-Kate and Ashley play completely opposite twins, Roxy and Jane
Ryan. While Jane is getting a 4.2 G.P.A. and applying for a fellowship
at Oxford University, Roxy is skipping school and rocking out to punk
in her spare time. The whole plot revolves around how Jane is giving a
speech to attain her fellowship at Colombia University while Roxy is
skipping school to attend a Simple Plan video shoot.

Then their misadventures start. In a blur of montages, the girls get
pursued by a pseudo-Chinese mobster, played oddly enough by Andy
Richter, whose bad Chinese accent and pasty complexion give New York
Minute a villain with the vision of a silly Conan O'Brien sketch. The
other factor that the girls have to worry about is truancy officer Max
Lomax, played by Eugene Levy. Eugene Levy still plays the socially
inept awkward dad that gives a subtle reminder to the hilarity of
American Pie. Both characters round out the villain department and
allow the movie to progress quickly with little doubt that the girls
will be fine by the end of the film.

There are other people in this film including Daryl Hammond, who plays
Hudson McGill, the trustee of the fellowship that Jane is striving for
and Jack Osborne, who makes his film debut as Roxy's band manager,
Justin.

With all the cameos and rapid transitions, kids love this movie and you
only need an attention span of about 30 seconds to follow this film.
Just to prove this to me, at the press screening, they allowed 15 kids
aging from

3-15 to view this movie. They all loved it, or at least said
they did.

To give Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen credit, they are skilled actors.
Acting since birth, producing since 6 and having millions of dollars in
revenue before the age of 10, these girls have done something right.
They can act well too. I was impressed by how well they did each scene
with the skill and grace of actresses of 17 years experience.

All and all, New York Minute is a good teenie bopper movie. They only
part of the story that drove insanity into my skull was a scene where
Jane is freaking out in a beauty parlor in Harlem and she is calmed
down by a rendition of "the itsy bitsy spider" by all the stylists in
the House of Bling. Now, living in NY for many years I just wanted to
point out that the odds of this happening in this universe or any
possible parallel universes are slim to none and simply the thought
still proves that white people can't do black comedy.

Your kids, assuming you have them, will like this movie. Not to mention
that the girls have a reputation and a label to live up too, so there
are no racy striping scenes or anything that would potentially demean
their reputation. So if the little ones are grabbing your ankles on a
rainy Sunday, take them to see this movie. They'll go to bed easily and
you won't have to worry about having the "what's an orgasm?"
conversation with them.

Overall Grade: C+

Synopsis:

In the tradition of Ferris Bueller's Day Off, the action comedy New York Minute follows one monumental day in the lives of 17-year-old sisters Jane and Roxanne Ryan, adversaries who begrudgingly journey together from their Long Island home to New York City, where meticulously prepared overachiever Jane (Ashley Olsen) is due to deliver a speech to qualify for a prestigious college scholarship abroad. Meanwhile, laid-back punk rock rebel Roxy (Mary-Kate Olsen) hopes to get backstage at an underground music video shoot and slip her demo tape to the band. But Roxy's and Jane's plans go wildly awry when a mix-up involving Jane's precious day planner lands them in the middle of a shady black market transaction. Pursued by an overzealous truant officer (Eugene Levy) and accused of kidnapping a Senator's dog, the Ryans must find a way to work together to thwart the forces threatening to jeopardize Jane's college dreams and ship Roxy off to a convent school.