Cherry Cherry Boom Boom

Rating: 9/10 (22 August 2010)

The Runaways is a culmination of everything I was hoping to observe and understand with this mini-series of reviews. It is the first great performance I've seen of Kristen Stewart. The film itself isn't remarkable in its story. The band it summarizes begins, has a degree of success, and ends in overindulgence of alcohol and drugs. It is a movie made because the principal actors were of age to play their parts, and the band had unique historical importance.
The real Runaways were a concept band organized by Kim Fowley in mid '70's. He had an idea of creating a teenage female-only hard rock group. He would promote their sex appeal to male audiences and contribute to a few of their songs. Many contemporary vocal groups have a debt of gratitude to the Runaways for ripping the rock and roll door off its hinges so they could enter. Fowley shouldn't be seen as a champion of women's rights, unlike you might think. He inadvertently became one out of his own curiosity. This didn't stop him from arranging striptease photo shoots for the girls or making unreasonable sexual demands of them. Now nearly four decades since his experiment, artists like Lady Gaga are able to utilize their sexuality into more experimental songwriting. The Runaways made this possible.
The movie begins with Joan Jett (Stewart) and Cherie Currie (Fanning) lazing away as outcast teens stuck in lives they aren't capable of living. Jett sees Fowley at a night club and introduces herself as an electric guitarist. He thinks, maybe, he can get a girl rock group together, since his dwarf band idea didn't work. He wanders around the club until he finds a hot, blonde girl to lead the band. Currie happens to be there and decides to audition. At the first practice, Jett and Fowley write an ad-lib song called "Cherry Bomb" about Currie's body (the boys wish they could have). Soon the band records an album and begins playing in hotels and other cheap venues.
The film doesn't forget that its players are still children. There are moments where they run up hills or drink stolen booze. They start to touch each other and take a cornucopia of drugs. After touring in Japan, the band begins to grow uneasy due to Currie's excessive personality and addictions. Currie finally leaves in '77 and the band dissolves a few years later.
This is the first time Stewart has appeared expertly cast in a film that I've seen. She is not able to play the traditionally feminine role of doting girlfriend. The Runaways liberates her of this restrictive requirement and let's her ruggedness come out of hibernation.
Through Fanning's Cherie, we see Stewart's surprisingly genuine vulnerability. You know what I mean. In many of her other films (even the better ones like Adventureland), she is forced to make herself appear more emotionally unstable than she looks to be. Finally, there is no requirement that she pander to some boy's need for her to be his girlfriend. And Fanning makes it all possible for Stewart. She is the most talented actor of either gender from my generation that I've had the pleasure of seeing. She has a Meryl Streep-like ability of blending into roles seamlessly. Recommended