Kristen Stewart (left) and Dakota Fanning in The Runaways.
Joan Jett and the Runaways packed shows and toured the
world in the '70s before self-destructing in a blaze of drugs,
jealousies and in-fighting. Now a movie documents those
rock'n'roll days.
Dakota Fanning's porcelain-doll features were swathed in
exotic makeup and her blonde hair coiffed into a feathery
shag; she raised her umpteenth shot of sake and cast a
knowing glance at Kristen Stewart.
The Twilight star held Fanning's gaze briefly and
toasted back, looking every inch the tough rocker chick, with
her matching black shag hairdo, spiked bracelet and
razor-blade charm necklace.
The actresses clinked glasses and giggled.
With downtown Los Angeles' Kyoto Grand Hotel standing in for
a bustling Tokyo sushi joint, the teen stars were on the set
of the coming-of-age drama The Runaways - in
character, with Fanning as Cherie Currie, the wild-child lead
singer of the titular all-girl rock group, and Stewart
portraying Joan Jett, its electric-guitar-wielding,
'tude-copping founder.
Between the years 1975 and '79, the Runaways packed shows,
toured the world and racked up hits before self-immolating in
a blaze of drugs, jealousies and in-fighting.
The Runaways is one of the most piquantly feminist
films to touch down this year - albeit a punk-infused genre
pic with a pronounced generational viewpoint and no shortage
of blood, drug abuse and bodily effluvia.
Written and directed by Floria Sigismondi, the acclaimed
photographer and music-video director behind such atmospheric
clips as Marilyn Manson's The Beautiful People and
Christina Aguilera's Fighter, the movie is less
intended as a by-the-book musical biopic a la The
Doors or La Bamba than an impressionistic
character study illuminating a unique female predicament:
What happens when teenage girls get handed too much, too soon
via worldwide rock stardom?
No stranger to the rock'n'roll life in her own right, the
Italian-born first-time feature director - a striking woman
with a mane of raven-black hair who was clad in a
vampire-chic, all-black ensemble on set - says she drew on
personal experience to connect with the characters.
"It's young girls getting swept up into a world they couldn't
handle," Sigismondi says.
"Feeding on those confusing feelings that develop from moving
from girl to woman, I could reach deep into myself to find
those things."
Sigismondi, who is married to Lillian Berlin, lead singer of
the hard-rocking alt-quartet Living Things, continues: "I
wanted to focus on Joan and Cherie.
"How different they are, how they were drawn together for
this crazy experience.
"Joan is so focused, she really wanted to have this band. And
Cherie wanted the rage of rock 'n' roll, the rebellion."
The film follows Currie at age 15 as she chafes against
suburban torpor and her family's psychological abandonment en
route to becoming the most forward female face in rock.
On a parallel track, Jett is shown raging against the
proverbial machine, defying all cultural expectation to stake
out her place as a young woman in the boys' club of hard rock
while still in her mid-teens.
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