Dakota Fanning still acts her age in The Runaways, but 1970s jailbait rocker is a role to shock anyone believing she's still that kewpie doll from I Am Sam, Dreamer and War of the Worlds.

As Runaways singer Cherie Currie, the 16-year-old actor vaults beyond ingenue to snorting a palm full of cocaine, groping male groupies and sharing a steamy same-sex kiss with co-star Kristen Stewart. Fanning also squeezes into Currie's signature lingerie to perform several Runaways hits, including that unsubtle anthem of teenage sexuality, Cherry Bomb.

The little girl is growing up fast, at least on screen.

In real life, Fanning is a cheerleader at her North Hollywood high school, an avid knitter, and dabbles in piano and violin while learning to speak French.

None of that jibes with Currie's amoral excesses, which is why her profession is called "acting." That's a contradiction moviegoers should get used to seeing, as Fanning explained during a telephone chat while on spring break:

You're smartly maturing on screen with your role choices, like The Runaways. Are these entirely your decisions, or your parents and advisors?

A lot of people are ultimately involved in the decisions, but at the end of the day it's me who has to decide. When you make a movie, you give a part of yourself to the character. I have to move me, and inspire me, at the end of the day. I know there's that certain feeling when you read a script and it speaks to you. You feel like it was made for you, in a way.

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The all-girl 1970s teenage rock band The Runaways is the subject of a new film called – what else? – “The Runaways.” It stars Kristen Stewart as Joan Jett and Dakota Fanning as Cherie Currie, the group’s two most charismatic – i.e., screwed up – members.

If, like me, you didn’t follow this cult band, the film, based on Currie’s autobiography and written and directed by rock video artist Floria Sigismondi, will probably seem fresher than it would to people who already know the lyrics to, say, “Cherry Bomb.”

Sigismondi was clearly attempting to avoid the usual rock-movie glitz-and-glory tropes, and she perhaps does too good a job. Much of “The Runaways” plays out in the key of dreary. But there’s a flinty integrity in this movie’s look at the rock grind, and Stewart and Fanning are intensely watchable. Grade: B (Rated R for language, drug use, and sexual content – all involving teens.)

Rock 'n' roll bio-pics are nothing new to Hollywood, and given the cable networks' documentaries that run consistently it's even trickier to elevate an up-and-down narrative capturing the peaks and valleys of a musician or band's career. Usually, we've seen it all before.

Every once in a while, however, a director finds a particular tale and has the right voice to make a successful film from elements that may seem redundant. Music video director Floria Sigismondi aims for that goal with her new film "The Runaways."

While many may not remember the short-lived female punk band, they have been listed by many later female acts and entertainers as a big influence. The film opens circa 1975 where we find friends and fellow underage club rats Cherie Curry (Dakota Fanning) and Joan Jett (Kristen Stewart) looking to start a band of their own and escape their bleak circumstances. Jett seems to have no one in her life, and Currie has an alcoholic father, a runaway mother and a sister who helps take care of things.

It isn't long before they cross paths with Kim Fowley (Michael Shannon, "Revolutionary Road"), a record producer with an extensive resume of bringing bands up through the ranks. Selling him on the idea of pioneering an all-girl rock band doesn't take very long, and scouting out Sandy West (Stella Maeve, "Gossip Girl") and Lita Ford (Scout Taylor-Compton, "Halloween II") the foursome is soon in training.

To say Fowley turns out to be a sleazy slave driver is an understatement - you know he is trying to prepare them in rough fashion for a profession ruled by men when he hires kids to come into the makeshift studio and fling dog feces at them. While the band is getting its jumpstart we also are following the relationship between Jett and Currie, handled deftly by the director, who suggests they were a little more than bandmates and friends.

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NEW YORK - NEW YORK - When Dakota Fanning was approached to play a sexed-up singer from the Seventies, she knew exactly what to do.

Hit YouTube.

"I didn't know a lot about The Runaways or Cherie Currie when I got the script, and I looked online to see the videos of the Live in Japan tour and her performing Cherry Bomb, and I realized that I wanted to play her," says Fanning, who knew of Joan Jett, but had little exposure to the electric era.

Jett is an executive producer of The Runaways (in theaters nationwide April 9), which is based on Currie's memoir and chronicles the sharp rise and fall of the all-girl band.

Fanning embraces her first major adult role playing lead singer and sex kitten Currie opposite a leather-studded, chin-jutting young Jett, played by Kristen Stewart.

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The Runaways," chronicling the rise and fall of Joan Jett's first band, easily could have degenerated into a movie-length music video, with Kristen Stewart and Dakota Fanning merely glam-rock poseurs.

Yet music-video veteran Floria Sigismondi makes an impressive feature-film directing debut, crafting a brisk, engaging portrait, the story making up for its lack of insight into teen rebel Jett and her bandmates with driving, infectious rhythm.

For Stewart as Jett and Fanning as Runaways singer Cherie Currie, the movie is a smart showcase to help them break out of their molds as they take on more adult roles, Stewart aiming for life after "Twilight" and Fanning seeking to graduate from her position as Hollywood's doe-eyed princess of child stars.

Both have done other mature roles - Stewart was a stripper and hooker in the upcoming "Welcome to the Rileys," Fanning played a teen rape victim in "Hounddog." Yet "The Runaways" will be an eye-opener for their fans, with Stewart and Fanning hurling themselves into the roles, their descent into the seedy 1970s world of sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll including a passionate kiss they share in one scene.
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The Mac Wire was lucky enough to get invited to the press junket for The Runaways where we got to interview all the major cast members. We interviewed Dakota Fanning (who plays Cherie Currie) and Kristen Stewart (who plays Joan Jett) together and it almost seemed like they were still in character - they kind of acted and dressed the same as their roles which took place in the mid-70s. We discussed getting into character and their take on what the real Runaways had to go through, including dealing with a fowl-mouthed bossy manager/producer (Kim Fowley as played by Oscar nominee Michael Shannon). This interview was "da bomb" for us - oops, make that a "Cherry Bomb"!

Q: How are you? Did you realize the dream of being rock stars in this film?
Dakota : I think I came as close as I will ever be to becoming a rock star in this film. I got out any desire I had! (Laughs.)
Kristen: I agree--I do not have it in me to be that sort of performer so this is the closest I will ever get to that.

Q: You were working on three movies together at the time! What was that like?
Kristen: Yeah, they are all very different to me.
Dakota: Yeah, we weren't collaborating so much together on New Moon. (Laughs.) It was nice to walk into this film knowing her though--we were both so excited about the movie that we spent the first to days clocking each other. I was just like, "Let's do this!" So it was nice being able to know her first.

Q: The Runaways is so much about female empowerment--what women in your personal and professional lives do you idolize?
Kristen: That's a tough one, man!
Dakota: In my personal life it is my mom--she is my best friend and she has been with me everyday throughout when I started in acting up through now.
Kristen: I will have to say my mom, too, since she said her mom! (Laughs.) And that is true. I am really lucky that I have grown up with really strong women. There is a big difference there, which is not the case with The Runaways. Joan has a really cool mom which is why she is like she is but generally back in the day it was not like that...which is great. And Joan also is a role model. I do not have many female role models even though a lot of females have done great things. The people for me and definitely Joan and my mom.

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