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FeedMovie Review: The Runaways
Films opening this week:
Date Night - Maple Ridge; Market Arcade; Elmwood, Transit, Galleria, Quaker, Hollywood Regals; Flix; Transit Drive-In
Mother - Amherst Dipson
North Face - North Park Dipson
The Runaways - Amherst Dipson; Quaker Regal
Welcome to the coming out party for the new, adult Dakota Fanning. The movie may be named The Runaways, after the band for whose short life it depicts, but this is most definitely the Cherie Currie story. When I first heard about the film beginning production, as well as all the hype surrounding Kristen Stewart’s casting as Joan Jett, I really couldn’t have cared less about the project. I chalked it up to being another "behind the music" tale of sex, drugs, and rock and roll.
But then I discovered that the script was based on Currie’s own autobiography; perhaps this focus would make things a bit tighter. Floria Sigismondi’s work may, indeed, feature sex, a lot of drugs, and blaring rock music, but it also shows how the publicity machine and the power of celebrity can work its way into an innocent child and change her life forever.
The Runaways were Joan Jett’s baby—she says so herself. Here was a young girl doing her best to stick out from the mainstream herd, plugging in her electric guitar when her instructor wanted an acoustic rendition of "On Top of Old Smokey." This scene is not only great because Fast Times’ Robert Romanus portrays the teacher, but also because this is the defining moment for Jett to go full bore into proving girls can rock just as hard as the boys.
She finds producer Kim Fowley outside a nightclub and pitches him the idea of an all-girl rock troupet. Soon she is in a trailer with a drummer, bass player, and guitarist, auditioning young Currie. They approached her because of her blonde bombshell looks—not the promise of anything musical. Yet, for a girl who refused to speak sexual innuendos, a girl who walked the walk but was still a sheltered kid at heart, Cherie found that inner beast inside, and growled her way to legend.
Cherie is only fifteen years old, has a drunkard dad living with his mother, a mother who just left for Indonesia with her boyfriend, and a sister doing all she can to support the group working at a fast food joint. We watch her break out of her shell on the road, hook up with her tour manager (it’s a pleasure seeing Johnny Lewis, Half Sack from “Sons of Anarchy,” in a film), and eventually experimenting with Jett herself, all while snorting coke and drinking enough to make her alcoholic father proud.
I do feel bad for Alia Shawkat, who doesn’t get to say a word as bassist Robin, and Scout Taylor-Compton, who gets to complain and scream at Cherie a couple times as Lita Ford, but I do think expanding their roles could only harm the film’s success. What makes it so much better than a standard music documentary is that we are allowed to see one girl’s fall from heights that were just too much for her to handle.
And while Stewart is great as Jett, this film is all about Dakota Fanning. Here is an actor who has a lot to overcome in the transition from cutie-pie child star to serious thespian. (For every Jodie Foster there's a Haley Joel Osment) Fanning is a revelation here, working every emotion to absolute effectiveness and leaving everything she has on film.
I’d be remiss to fail in mentioning the wonderful Michael Shannon as Fowley, but the true third star of the movie is the combo of Sigismondi’s direction and Benoît Debie’s cinematography. I can’t remember the number of times I was mesmerized by the close-ups, the angles, the shallow depth of field, or frame rate changes causing frenetic concert performances to slow as one of the girls plays her guitar or whips her hair back. It’s the use of light, however—washing out some frames, sparse in others full of the night sky, and kinetically strobing in club scenes of girls dancing—that helps show why this will be one of the best indie films of the year. It's completely unafraid to stick out from the crowd, much like the women on display.
The Runaways 8/10
photography:
[1] Kristen Stewart as Joan Jett, Dakota Fanning as Cherie Currie and Alia Shawkat as Robin in The Runaways.
[2] Michael Shannon star as Kim Fowley in Floria Sigismondi The Runaways.
