Not Coming to a Theater Near You
There are things you do hate, Lord. Perfume-smellin’ things, lacy things, things with curly hair.
There are things you do hate, Lord. Perfume-smellin’ things, lacy things, things with curly hair.
Ladies and Gentlemen, the Fabulous Stains is far from the best movie or the most authentic artifact of the punk era, but it has an odd power lacking in some of the more reputable contenders. The story of an all-girl punk band directed by record producer Lou Adler (of Cheech & Chong Up In Smoke fame), written by Oscar winner Nancy Dowd, and starring Diane Lane and Laura Dern at the tender ages of 15 and 13 respectively, Stains has a quality of intense earnestness coupled with ultimate bemusement. In other words, it’s a movie made by sympathetic older people who don’t quite understand punk, but who do understand what it’s reacting against: the decadence of late seventies rock’n’roll and the hopelessness of working-class youth. Hence the Tubes’ Fee Waybill as washed-up glitter rocker Lou Corpse is the best-drawn character, and the deeply concerned liberal TV news reporter the most obvious proxy for the filmmaker/viewer. Less convincing are the Stains themselves, who seem to be modeled on the Slits or Siouxsie and the Banshees, but are more like Josie and the Pussycats plus anomie (key line: “I’m perfect, but no one in this shit-hole gets me, ‘cause I don’t put out”). All of them are really just sketches of angry kids, and while Adler and Dowd seem to think that they’re right to be angry, they still can’t work out what it’s all about, a confusion that edges towards condescension at times. Tonally the film veers between quasi-documentary and teen-flick boilerplate, not quite nailing either mode, and some scenes (like the tacked-on ending, where the Stains basically transform into the Bangles) are simply awful. But it’s certainly worth a look if you’re interested not so much in punk rock as in the punk moment, and the productive misunderstandings it generated.
by Evan Kindley | Source: Paramount DVD
01 Nov 2008 9:50 PM | Submit Comment
