"A
Movie to Sing About – Hedwig a Rockin’ Good Time"
Simply
put, John Cameron Mitchell and Stephen Trask’s film version of
their Off-Broadway smash Hedwig
and the Angry Inch is the year’s most enjoyable movie.
It’s a bouncy, energetic, dynamic, loopily fun confection of
rock’n’roll and gender dysphoria. It’s Rocky
Horror for a new millennium; a post-punk odyssey of love and
longing filled with wit and surprisingly poignant observations
on the human condition.
Fresh
off its successful launch at the 2001 Sundance Film Festival
where it walked off with the audience award for best dramatic
film, and a directing award for first-timer Mitchell, Hedwig
now descends upon the rest of the U.S. like a beer-swigging Glam
rock tour. Like the return of the Go-Go’s and Madonna, the
film is a gotta-see-it extravaganza and one of the year’s most
pleasant surprises.
For
those that don’t know, the film follows the travels of young
post-op transsexual Hedwig (Mitchell) and his Glam-punk rock
band The Angry Inch as they make their way across Middle America
performing in strip malls and buffet-style seafood restaurants.
They're following the mega-tour of young Tommy Gnosis (Michael
Pitt), a Bowie-like superstar who once was Hedwig’s lover and
pupil. But just as Anakin Skywalker morphed into Darth Vader,
young Tommy brutally stole away from his lover’s arms using
her songs to bring himself fame and fortune.
As
the group gallivants across the country in Spinal Tap flourish,
Hedwig’s story is told using flashback, music, narration and
animation. From her beginnings as a young boy named Hansel
making the least of life in East Germany to the surgery that
transforms the lad into the fiery dynamo Hedwig (leaving her
with the titular “angry inch”), the singer’s story is
filled with heartbreak, triumph and surreal hilarity. It’s a
pitch-perfect musical confection and the audience is a joyful
participant along for ride.
A
crackerjack team of filmmakers has helped bring this stage
sensation to the scream. From musical director Trask’s
expanding of the play’s songs and lyrics to Frank DeMarco’s
(Habit) luminous
cinematography, everything about this film has been handled in
exquisite detail. Special note must be given to Arianne
Phillips’ (The People
vs. Larry Flint) brilliant costumes and to Thérèse
DePrez’s (High Fidelity, Summer of Sam)
fantastic production design, both of which are so integral to
the mechanics of the film.
At
the very least, Hedwig announces
with a great guttural wail the arrival of a huge talent in John
Cameron Mitchell. Whether as writer, director or star, Mitchell
shows an unerring eye for detail that is astonishingly vibrant.
In lesser hands the movie could have been ham-handed farce,
nothing more than enjoyable matinee filler. In his, Hedwig and the Angry Inch is a powerfully profound journey; a
mesmerizing gift of romance, music, love, hate and how the
fickle fingers of fate shape even the most minute details of
everyday life.
It’s
a great story and an excellently entertaining film. With so many
of this summer’s fare leaving me pummeled to the point of
despair, Hedwig is the
most fun I’ve had at the movies this year. It left me
re-inspired and re-invigorated with the thought of going to the
theater no longer a reason for despondency. It made me believe
once more that a movie house can be the place where dreams come
alive and that life’s lessons can sometimes be learned in the
lyrics of a song.
