This in-your-face look at teenage life and the rock scene in mid-1970s Los Angeles begins with menstrual blood dripping from a 15-year-old, who's having her first period on the way to an outing with her elder sister. The movie is a sex'n'drugs'n'rock'n'roll biopic of the first big rock girl band, the Runaways, a collection of social misfits brought together and manipulated into becoming a provocative quintet by the grotesque, foul-mouthed promoter Kim Fowley (Michael Shannon).

It's an unedifying story given a certain sheen by Floria Sigismondi, an experienced director of pop videos, whose first feature this is. Kristen Stewart from the Twilight series plays the group's driving force, Joan Jett, who still performs and is credited as co-producer. Former child star Dakota Fanning plays the band's star attraction, Cherie Currie, disturbed daughter of a broken marriage who became the lead singer.

Cherie was chosen by Fowley for her resemblance to the pouting Brigitte Bardot and advertised, aged 15, as "jailbait". She ended up addicted to booze and drugs and appeared in the 1980 Adrian Lyne/David Puttnam film Foxes. The Runaways is based on her autobiography, Neon Angel. She's now, we're told, working in the Valley as a chainsaw artist.