Dakota Fanning deals with rape and child abuse in 'Hounddog.'
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Cute-as-a-button child star Dakota Fanning, who turned 12 in February,
is venturing into sexually disturbing territory in a movie being filmed
in North Carolina.
The screenplay for "Hounddog" - a dark story of abuse, violence and
Elvis Presley adulation in the rural South, written and directed by
Deborah Kampmeier - calls for Fanning's character to be raped in one
explicit scene and to appear naked or clad only in "underpants" in
several other horrifying moments.
Fanning's mother, Joy, and her Hollywood agent, Cindy Osbrink, see the
movie as a possible Oscar vehicle for the pint-size star. But despite
Fanning's status as a bankable actress - whose movies, including last
year's "War of the Worlds," have earned more than half a billion
dollars since 2001 - the alarming material seems to have scared off
potential investors from the under-$5 million indie project.
"The two taboos in Hollywood are child abuse and the killing of
animals," a source close to the situation told me. "In this movie, both
things happen."
Fanning's carefully choreographed rape scene has already been filmed.
But then the production - which also stars Robin Wright Penn, David
Morse and Piper Laurie - was shut down for lack of funds. Penn, who's
also an executive producer, gave a pep talk to the dispirited cast in
the days leading up to the shutdown. The desperate producer, Jen
Gatien, daughter of former club czar Peter Gatien, sent out an SOS to
New York entertainment entrepreneur Lawrence Robins. Robins located
emergency investors, filming resumed, and the movie is scheduled to
wrap tomorrow.
"The subject matter is very tough," Robins told me, "but I was
attracted to it because in the end it's a story about human
understanding, about a little girl who's dealt a very bad deck of
cards, but finds solace in the music of Elvis and survives."
The script requires the preteen actress to confront tougher challenges
than Brooke Shields and Jodie Foster did when, at Fanning's age, they
played child prostitutes.
"It's not just the rape scene - the whole story is challenging Dakota
as an actress," Fanning's longtime agent, Osbrink, told me. "And I've
never been so proud of her in my life. I've seen the dailies, and in
every scene she gets better and better."