Hedwig: Rock, Amor e Traição

I watched this mainly because Joan Jett rocked with the star of it back in 2001 or so. So, I just expected a rock musical about a drag queen that wanted to make it big, nothing more. But, I was pleasantly surprised to find that this was so much more than that!

First off, this film is such a visual piece of art! Secondly, the songs are great! And third- and most important, this film is a beautiful bending of visual and intellectual ideas. It's quite absurdist and crude at times, but mostly, it's philosophical, spiritual and sweet. This is a twin flame movie, for sure! I loved it!

No matter how much I do praise it, I'll end up turning people against it. But, let me ask you: what were you expecting when you first heard of Hedwig and the Angry Inch? It's been billed as a punk rock musical about a transsexual from East Germany who was duped into coming to live in a trailer park in Kansas City. So what was I expecting? A gay camp film. I had no doubts that it would be anything else. And that's not to say that I wouldn't have enjoyed a gay camp movie. After all, I liked Moulin Rouge. But I got a surprise that was entirely unexpected: what I experienced was the best new film I had seen in years. And I mean that. Hedwig and the Angry Inch is equally hilarious and touching. Not that I want to spread cliches, but I seriously laughed and I seriously cried, often simultaneously. This manages to be the best American comedy since, damn, Preston Sturges was still writing and directing. It's easily the best movie musical since Cabaret. It's also one of the most heartfelt and passionate dramas, and one of the best character studies I've ever seen. Along with that, John Cameron Mitchell delivers a performance that perhaps hasn't been equalled since, I don't know, Robert DeNiro in Raging Bull, which might be the ultimate cinematic character study. I shouldn't say that, because it might hint that Hedwig is a dark character, but, well, I'd call her just a great protagonist. She's a heroine, especially to anyone experiencing sexual confusion, but even to me, a straight, Midwestern boy. Hedwig is a heroine for anyone who's ever felt that they've been treated like crap their entire life. I wanted to clap for and support Hedwig emotionally throughout the entire film. In short, Hedwig is a character I deeply loved, equal to just a few other characters I've met throughout my extensive journeys in the cinema. Parallel to a situation in the film, if I should ever see John Cameron Mitchell on the street, I'd have to hug him.

I also have another heap of praise that I have to go through before I am done. I've always thought that movie musicals adapted from stage plays were the death of the genre. Only a few exceptions ever seemed more than unimaginative, slavish films that worked only to bring Broadway to an audience who could or would never visit NYC. Cabaret was the one big exception that I had seen previously, but you also hear West Side Story mentioned as being a great film. But, in adapting a stage play for the screen, I always expect the film to seem stranded on stage. To boot, Hedwig had another mark against it: the director, Mitchell again, had never directed a film before. Well, I really don't know what training he had in the art, but it must have been enough. The cinematic art, at least the visual aspect of it, has nearly been forgotten in the 1990s and 2000s, but John Cameron Mitchell creates a visual tour de force as much as he does one of writing and acting. I love the scene where Hedwig the adult reminisces about how his mother forced him to put his head in the oven if he wanted to sing when he was a child. And Hedwig and the Angry Inch's (that's the band's name as well as the film's) appearance outside the Menses Festival next to the port-o-potties. A goth chick, who presumably didn't have tickets for the actual Menses Festival, watches the band in deep curiosity and confusion; Hedwig invites the girl to sit up on stage with her while she relates her past. I also love the sequence where the American G.I. discovers him laying naked in rubble. Hedwig's original name was Hansel, which leads to one of the funniest jokes I can ever recall seeing. Or how about the scene where Hedwig, when babysitting, discovers Tommy, the future rock star who steals all her songs, masturbating in the bath tub? That scene is handled so well that I almost died laughing. To tell you the truth, I don't think there is anything ostensibly wrong with the film, period. I just wanted to talk about the amazing direction because the one review of it I have on hand says "the direction can't help from being flat." FLAT? How can you say that it is flat? PS: The animated number and the song that goes along with it is adapted from Aristophanes' speech in Plato's Symposium, about which I wrote my senior thesis in college. The rock star's stage name, Gnosis, is Ancient Greek for "knowledge," which Hedwig actually says in the film. One of the filmmakers must have learned Ancient Greek at some point in his life. Bravo, good sirs.

Already the winner of numerous awards including the Audience and Director awards at Sundance, this is the film of an original stage musical comedy that played off Broadway for over two years. It centres on Hedwig, whose only way of escaping from East Berlin is to undergo a sex-change and assume his mother's identity. Unfortunately the operation goes wrong and he is left with an `angry inch'. Escaping to America, he forms a rock band whilst seeking the soul partner that will fulfil his destiny. Loaded with songs that you will be humming all the way out of the cinema, Hedwig and the Angry Inch is the funniest, most outrageously entertaining movie of its kind since Rocky Horror. Unlike Rocky Horror, it does have some more serious philosophical reflections built into it (mostly via the songs), but it rocks, kicks ass and injects some seriously funny pizzaz into the transgender scene. I had the advantage not only of seeing the UK stage version a few days after the film, but also hearing the director speak about his work at the UK premiere. As a first time film effort it's quite an accomplishment, but as Cameron also played Hedwig in the stage version he had a starter for ten. On the down-side, the film is probably better on second or third viewing, when all the pieces would fit into place, and towards the end there is a tendency to tell the story only in songs and so at the expense of any serious script writing. But still it's a must-see movie.

Adapted from an off-Broadway show, "Hedwig and the Angry Inch" is the end result of 6 years of character and idea evolution by creator John Cameron Mitchell. Equal parts musical, mockumentary, and drama, the film pleases on all levels.

The film's musical numbers are brilliantly crafted and cross several different genres. A country-flavored number, "Sugar Daddy", appears smack-dab in the middle of all the punk and glam rock tunes, daring anyone to doubt the soundtrack's variety. The majority of the songs are catchy and great fun to listen to ("Wig in a Box" even has a karaoke sing-a-long during the second chorus), while staying true to the themes of the movie and Hedwig's life. John Cameron Mitchell (Hedwig) sings live vocals over a pre-recorded band mix, and this definitely lends more of a live concert feel than if he had simply lip-synched all the songs for the role. The majority of the cast is reunited from the original cast of the "Hedwig and the Angry Inch" play, so fans of the original play who have not seen the movie need not worry about "outsiders" ruining it in transition.

The film's mockumentary nature mainly results from how the songs, being "autobiographical", are preceded by scenes of commentary by Hedwig and a flashback from her life. While the transition from real time to flashback is usually made quite clear, some scenes (particularly the climax, which is a mess trying to piece together) are confusing as to what is real and what is flashback. The rest of the mockumentary comes between musical sequences, during Hedwig's interaction with her manager, band, and showing of mixed feelings towards Tommy Gnosis, an ex-lover who stole all her material for his own album and is now a popular teen idol. Her interactions with husband Yitzhak (who, due to an excellent make-up job and performance by original cast member Miriam Shor, I had no idea was played by a woman until I saw "Like It or Not", a documentary on the film included on the DVD) would have made the list as well, had a vital character-development scene with Yitzhak (the only non-Hedwig flashback in the entire movie) been left in the final cut; as it is, Yitzhak serves only as Hedwig's back-up singer and whipping boy, a much less important character. Most of the film's situations, however, are explained well, via flashback or dialogue, and have well-written gay and transsexual jokes.

Underneath all the humor and the music, however, is the serious theme of feeling spiritually "whole". Hedwig seems to interpret this (through the song "Origin of Love" and some interesting animated vignettes) as through finding love and one's soul-mate. Mitchell, who knows his character better than anyone, gives an amazing performance and is not only able to portray Hedwig's bitchy diva side, but also able to make the audience sympathize with why she acts that way (unlike real-life divas), and how deeply her inner feelings and her failures so far at "becoming whole" through a relationship trouble her.

Having not even the faintest idea of what the film was about other than that it was a musical, I was very pleasantly surprised at how much fun I had with Hedwig, and how at the same time it never strayed far from its serious theme. In its journey from a character, to a play, to a movie, "Hedwig and the Angry Inch" has won over audiences as well as taken home accolades at Sundance, but has not had much mainstream success (chalk this up to its "controversial" transsexual main character and the popularity of "Moulin Rouge!", an experiment in stylistic over-extravagance, which is bigger and flashier than "Hedwig" due to its grand budget but lacks the sense of "genuine" emotion in the plot). This is quite tragic, because in retrospect, "Hedwig and the Angry Inch" was definitely one of 2001's best films.

The press kit touts this film as a "Post-punk neo-glam rock odyssey," based on the hit off-broadway show that ran in New York from 1998-2000. Some people have compared it to the Rocky Horror Picture Show, but that's only because it's the only other Glam Rock musical ever made into a movie.

The premise alone should make you want to see it: A rock-and-roll drag queen tells her bizarre life story, starting as a boy in East Berlin, falling in love with an American GI, and going for a sex-change operation, waking up to find nothing but a "one-inch mound of flesh" where her organ should be. The story takes more twists and turns after that, and I don't want to spoil anything.

The story is told mostly through the songs, which are perfect rock and roll gems, on par with the songs from Tommy. After only seeing it once, I walked away singing the words "Six inches forward and five inches back...I've got an angry inch!" over and over for days.

For a directorial debut with no big-name movie stars, the acting is right on the mark. These are theater people, after all, and there's none of the cringeworthy bad acting you see in a lot of independent films. John Cameron Mitchell gives the character Hedwig so much emotional depth, you forget that the premise is so silly.

The costumes are amazing, as you would expect from a movie with a drag queen as the main character. Hedwig wears no less than 41 outfits, one of which is a dress made entirely of hair.

I came away from this movie totally inspired. It positively electrified me with an energy I rarely feel from movies anymore. And I don't even like musicals!