Sun-Times Film Critic 'The two worst years of a woman's life," writes Nell Minow, "are the year she is 13 and the year her daughter is." There are exceptions to the rule; I recently attended a 13th birthday party at which daughter and mother both seemed to be just fine, thanks, but it is hard to imagine a worse year than the one endured by the characters in "Thirteen." This is the frightening story of how a nice girl falls under the influence of a wild girl and barely escapes big, big, big trouble, by which I mean drugs, crime, unwanted pregnancies, and other hazards that some teenagers seem inexplicably eager to experience. That the horrors in this movie are worse than those found in the lives of most 13-year-olds, I believe and hope. It is painful enough to endure them at any age, let alone in a young and vulnerable season when life should be wondrous. But I believe such things really happen to some young teenagers, because at Sundance last January I met Nikki Reed, who co-wrote the screenplay when she was 13, and was 14 when she played Evie, the movie's troublemaker. In real life Reed was the good girl; here, as a wild and seductive bad influence, she's so persuasive and convincing I'm prepared to believe the movie is a truthful version of real experiences.