For what it’s worth, it’s perfect casting, but there’s still something surprising about the news that Dakota Fanning is taking on the starring role in Floria Sigismondi’s film about ’70s girl group The Runaways. As 15-year-old rocker Cherie Currie, Fanning will continue to bait stories about how quickly she’s growing up, though really the part seems both ironic and appropriate for the former child actress. Currie, who fronted the band wearing a lot of low-cut tops and lingerie on the outside (before Madonna!), may have grown up too fast thanks to her sexualized image and early abuses of drugs and alcohol, but just because Fanning will play the part doesn’t mean she’ll be similarly thrust into adulthood. If anything, her masquerade as Currie will be more effective if audiences recognize that Fanning is still a little girl.
Fanning remains on track to be her generation’s Jodie Foster (who, interestingly enough, costarred with Currie in the movie Foxes), rather than her generation’s Drew Barrymore. And at best this could be her Taxi Driver (at worst, it’s actually her Foxes). Unfortunately, Fanning is a young girl in the age of creepy Internet comments and count-down clocks (not to mention the truly terrible examples of pedophilia to be found on the web), so much of the response to her casting is going to be stuck in predictably thoughtless concerns for her fading innocence and joked anticipation of her innocence lost.
Here are some of the blogged expectations for how the role will impact Fanning’s age and image:
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MoMA and the Film Society of Lincoln Center have released the schedule for New Directors/New Films, and as in the past, it’s heavy on films that recently played Sundance, including award winners (Push, We Live in Public, The Cove and The Maid). I’m looking forward to catching Amreeka (the ND/NF opening night film), Stay the Same Never Change and Unmade Beds, all of which I missed in Park City, as well as Bob Byington’s Harmony and Me, a world premiere starring Justin Rice.
indieWIRE has the full lineup. ND/NF starts March 25.
To loosely paraphrase Journey: the Sundance movie deals never end, they go on and on and on and on. As Magnolia announces (via indieWIRE) that they’ve picked up Sundance Narrative Competition title Arlen Faber (starring Jeff Daniels, Lauren Graham and Olivia Thirlby) the biggest deal of the festival is getting infinitely more complicated. We’ve added Faber to our Sundance 2009 deal chart, and have also ammended the purchase price of Humpday. We’ll hold off on ammending the Push entry to reflect Harvey Weinstein’s claims, at least for now.
In a turn of events that recalls an infamous Sundance story of yore, Harvey Weinstein is insisting that The Weinstein Co. locked down rights to Push (not that one, the Sundance one) before Lionsgate made its deal. Fortunately for everyone in Park City, this fight waited until after the film festival ended and ol’ Harv was nowhere near making a scene in a restaurant. Instead, the rights tug-of-war is going to the courts (on both coasts), making everyone think this is the indie version of the Watchmen battle and giving the blogs something more interesting than actors’ rants and masquerades to comment on:
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Are you one of the many sci-fi and comic book geeks who’d be more interested in Push were it not for Dakota Fanning? Sure, the precocious child star is now a teen actress (she’s about to turn 15), yet that probably makes you even more worried about her appearance in the movie. But what can you do? She’s literally everywhere this week – voicing the title character in the animated Coraline and starring in two new video releases, Hounddog and The Secret Life of Bees, both of which were released Tuesday. In the tradition of child actors continuing careers into adolescence, it’s only a matter of time before she ruins a movie that would have been better without her.
We’ll have to wait until this weekend to see if that time is now, with Push, but in the meantime let’s take a look at some of the past offenders in this tradition. Most of the following former child actors (our definition: actors that began their career below the age of 13) have done great things in their adulthood, but each has done at least one film that could have been better without him or her. You may disagree with some of these picks, and you may think we’ve forgotten some (was Christian Bale really the worst part of The Dark Knight? did Mary-Kate Olsen’s disturbing kiss with Ben Kingsley take away from The Wackness?), so do share your own thoughts on former child stars below. We just ask that you keep your comments somewhat tasteful and law-abiding.
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Variety reports that Lionsgate has signed a deal to acquire Sundance Grand Jury and Audience Award winner Push: Based on the Novel by Sapphire, directed by Lee Daniel and featuring a tour de force supporting performance from Mo’Nique. According to the bare-bones news blurb, “Oprah Winfrey and Tyler Perry will support Lionsgate’s distribution through their respective motion picture companies.”
This news brings two thoughts immediately to mind: 1) the old conception of Lionsgate as a slash-horror factory is even more out of date this afternoon than it was this morning; and 2) Being that Lionsgate were rumored to be zeroing in on Push at least hours if not days before it won multiple awards on the final night of Sundance, if they were waiting for Oprah and Perry to pledge assistance before making the deal final and/or public, then maybe there’s something to the whispers (largely drowned out by media coverage of those awards, but still prevalent on the ground in Park City) that just because rich white people (ie: critics, Sundance audiences and jury members) take an interest in an art film about poor black people, that doesn’t guarantee an easy path to selling the film to actual black people.
The fine details of racial demographics may or may not be the major factor here, but it’s certain that this is a time for safe bets, and it doesn’t get much safer than aligning an unknown quantity indie with name brands.
In any case, check out our Sundance review and interview with Mo’Nique.
UPDATE: indieWIRE is pegging the value of the deal at $5.5 million, making it the biggest of Sundance 2009.
indieWIRE polled a number of critics and bloggers (including yours truly) on their favorite films and performances at this year’s Sundance, and the results are in: the pros think the jury and the audience got it right in selecting Push: Based on the novel by Sapphire as the best narrative feature at the festival. I didn’t see that film (Paul did the review, and Eric Kohn interviewed Mo’Nique for us), and in general my ballot included a few films that didn’t make the consensus cut; I’ve pasted it after the jump if you want to take a look-see.
indieWIRE also posted some anonymous comments from participants, including one which I think I mostly agree with in sentiment, but which still irks me a bit:
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Push took top prizes at Sundance 2009 (Grand Jury for Drama, Audience Award and special acting prize for Mo’Nique), but–like a lot of prize winners in the past–it may prove to be too much for regular audiences. During the Q&A after the screening I attended, a girl stood up and said, “I’m from Harlem and I know people like that, but I’ve never seen it on a screen before.” She then thanked director Lee Daniels through her tears and sat down. It was the kind of moment Sundance programmers live for.
This small, risk-taking film does show something that hasn’t been on a screen before, and it eclipses the feel-good-and-give-me-your-money bigger pictures. Push: Based on the Novel by Sapphire is a simple story about an uneducated, pregnant girl in Harlem circa 1987. It leaves you a sweaty wad of mixed emotions and defies you to figure you what you’re feeling and why you feel it.
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Lee Daniels‘ Push has proven to be one of the most divisive high profile movies at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival. Splitting audiences is nothing to new Daniels, whose Shadowboxer remains generally maligned, but Push at least plays well to a good number of people. A heavily stylized account of troubled, overweight Harlem teen Precious (newcomer Gabourey Sidibe), who has been impregnated by her mother’s boyfriend, the movie barrels forward with a frenetic pace.
While some people think Push is too obvious or jarring — I don’t — one performer unarguably reaches her full emotional potential: Mo’Nique, boldly playing against type as Mary, Precious’s crazed single mom. The true villain of the movie, she’s also its tragic centerpiece. The usually, delightfully raunchy comedian turns in a forceful, haunting performance that prompted one audience member, after the premiere on Friday, to ask her what she plans to wear when she wins an Oscar. “Nothing,” she replied. A few days later, over coffee on Main Street, we asked Mo’Nique to elaborate on her dynamic accomplishment.
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The first ever Summit Pictures Comic-Con panel, which was met with snores up until the Twilight segment began, and then really began amidst continuous Beatlemania-like screaming from fangirls. Oh, and we learned a few new things about Alex Proyas’ Knowing and Paul McGuigan’s Push.
Highlights:
- The Twilight actors are really into themselves.
- Robert Pattinson is one of the most wanted guys in the world.
- Robert Pattinson’s band might be providing a tune to the Twilight soundtrack.
- Nic Cage is in another movie about a foreseen disaster (Knowing).
- Alex Proyas is not directing The Silver Surfer.
- Dakota Fanning was the surprise guest (really she was just late), and she’s all grown up.
Read the liveblogging transcript after the jump.
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Aside from the Brooklyn’s Finest 
