The Runaways
Writer-director Floria Sigismondi's grungy, stylish biopic charts the swift rise and even more rapid decline of teen rock sensations the Runaways, a ragtag band of no-nonsense girls that hung together for four years and, in the original lineup, released just two albums. Like so many influential acts from the '70s, the Runaways' length of existence does not reconcile with their level of influence. Their proto-pop/metal sound can still be heard in modern bands like the Donnas. Assembled by bipolar Svengali Kim Fowley (Michael Shannon, easily the film's most vibrant asset), the Runaways -- rugged Joan Jett (Kristen Stewart), rebellious guitarist Lita Ford (Scout Taylor-Compton), laid-back drummer Sandy West (Stella Maeve) and lead singer Cherie Currie (Dakota Fanning) -- wrestle with coming of age amid the hedonistic excess of L.A.'s rock scene. Although Sigismondi does a fine job capturing the debauched skuzziness of the Runaways' brief existence, too much of the film feels like an über-expensive music video. At seven Dallas-Fort Worth theaters. In wide release on April 9.
Repo Men
As companies go, The Union is today's nightmares writ large -- a for-profit healthcare company that operates like a car-loan specialist. The Union makes artificial organs and sells them with a "What's it going to take to put this pancreas in you?" hustle. But what happens if you can't pay your note? They send repo men, armed with tasers and portable field-surgery kits to cut that metal-and-plastic heart, lung, liver out on the spot. Repo Men is a slasher movie masquerading as social satire, a blood-spattered gorefest about the heartless thugs who do such work, and what happens when one of those thugs (Jude Law) has to get his own implant and can't swing the payments. But whatever wit the script aims for is lost in the queasy details. In wide release.
