RATING: B

ITN Distribution presents a B22 Films/Redford Films production. Written, lensed, edited, and directed by Brett Bentman. Produced by Tiffany McDonald. 

Stars Indira Starr, Cliff Dean, Hannah Hueston, Erin Marie Garrett, Derrick Redford, Joplyn McDonald, and Tiffany McDonald. 

The Disney character is back with a vengeance in her first major outing since entering public domain. 

Twenty years ago, teenage bullies Evie, Bell, Honey, and Will chased down young Winnie. Always tormenting her despite Will having a bit of a soft spot, the group goes too far when they force Winnie to go inside a storm shelter. Locking her in the shelter, they leave her inside as they move on with their lives. 

Fast forward to the present day. Now grown up, the bullies have gotten together for a reunion in their old town. Will has become a doctor and Bell, Honey, and Evie are still up to their old selves. However, someone else has joined them. After twenty years in the shelter, Winnie, who has now become Minnie has returned. Sporting a mask and finding herself close to the rats, she is ready to exact revenge on her tormentors for ruining her life. Now, she’s ready to ruin theirs. 

With Steamboat Willie entering public domain in 2025, we’ve had some pretty good and not so good films revolving around the OG version of Mickey Mouse. However, Screamboat teased the appearance of Minnie Mouse as she would be entering public domain this year and finally, we have the first film revolving around Minnie as the central character here. How does it fare? 

The angle of a bully seeking revenge is quite intriguing for this genre of the public domain horror films. Because it seems like until now, the characters who are in public domain kill because they want to as a means of pleasure and not so much revenge. Here, Brett Bentman does a good job in terms of making Minnie a once-bullied teen who now as an adult, is ready to unleash her revenge a la Marty Rantzen from Slaughter High. 

Kudos goes out to Tiffany McDonald as the adult Minnie. While we briefly glimpse her face before she sports the mask, she does a great job at playing Minnie as a non-verbal character. Perhaps it is the trauma she experienced that causes her to play it as a mute killer. Her use of pantomime works quite well here and when she finally does begin to unleash her assault, she does it with ease and goes stalkerish before the mayhem begins. 

Out of the four bullies, Cliff Dean’s Will is the one still haunted by memories of the events because he has had deep regrets for so long and had even at one point, tried to stop the trio of “mean girls” from doing what they did. Out of the trio, Hannah Hueston’s Evie is the only one who takes pride in what she did and still acts like she is queen bee after all these years. Honey, played by Erin Marie Garrett, seems to be the ditzy one while Indira Starr’s Bell harbors regret as well for her past actions and wishes she could have stopped Evie from locking Winnie in the shelter.

As for the kills, surprisingly they are not that gory. It doesn’t go too over the top, relying mainly on stabbings and throat slashings. However, there is one moment that will definitely come out as gross and is reminiscent of something you’d expect in a Troma movie. Watching this scene, I even nearly gagged at what was seen. Nevertheless, the finale does take an unexpected turn…or is it really unexpected? Could a sequel be on the horizon?

Minnie’s Midnight Massacre is actually a pretty good intro into the Minnie Mouse horror film as it is not too over the top and has the bully revenge angle quite well. Tiffany McDonald’s performance is definitely worth checking out here as she does a great job using her body language as Minnie.