Director: John Cameron Mitchell
Starring: John Cameron Mitchell, Michael Pitt, Miriam Shor, Stephen Trask

‘Don’t you know me Kansas City, I’m the new Berlin wall! Try and tear me down!’

From the moment her voice rips over the scribbled credits, it is clear that ‘Hedwig and the Angry Inch’ is going to take you to places you never expected. And when the guitars kick in, well, let’s just say it’s rock and roll.

It’s the mid-sixties, and a young boy named Hansel lives on the East Berlin side of the wall, with a mother who believes Hitler died for our sins. Lying in the oven in their small apartment, Hansel listens to the songs of Lou Reed and David Bowie, dreaming of an American myth, and a walk on the wild side. Hansel’s American dreams turn to possibility when a GI finds him sunning on a broken piece of church and falls in love, promising to marry and take him to America. There is, however, one condition: he has the operation and takes on his mother’s name — Hedwig.

One botched operation later, Hedwig and her eangry inch’ are left to rot in a Kansas trailer park, and her own pursuit of the American dream begins.

‘Hedwig’ was adapted from John Cameron Mitchell’s cult off-Broadway musical. As a very personal project for Mitchell, he takes on the directing, writing and starring roles in his first venture into film, throwing out the rulebooks on all of the above and letting a genuinely new, exciting film explode onto the screen. His performance as Hedwig is both vicious and tender, creating a character certain to live on outside the constrictions of celluloid.

Hedwig’s story is told in flashback from the stage, as she tours America through a chain of bankrupt restaurants and distant stages in far-off fields at festivals. Mostly, it is told through the songs, which are nothing short of superb. One of the reasons Hedwig succeeded so well on the stage was that it did something stellar, and unusual, with the music — it rocked. Backed by such luminaries as the legendary Bob Mould (Sugar, H,sker D,), Mitchell belts out songs with an intense glam-rock sensibility, exorcising demons in a way only a truly kick-ass power chord can. If you have the urge to jump up in the cinema and scream ekick out the jams, motherfucker!’ don’t be surprised.

The hand scribbled animations of Emily Hubley play a unique but very compelling role as the stories and the songs unfold, and Hedwig’s bizarre life is laid bare for her diner audiences to digest. Her interpretations of Mitchell’s words create an abstract but moving alternate world in which Hedwig’s confusions are more literally and movingly interpreted. The integration between animation and live-action is seamless in a film ruled in its visuals by the surreal and mischievous storytelling whims of a pissed off transgendered rock singer who knows that there is no such thing as truth.

With any stage translation, it can be a battle to transcend the limitations of the original script. Mitchell succeeds for ninety percent of ‘Hedwig’ by pushing things to an extreme in the way only a first time director can — breaking rules because he doesn’t know they exist, and challenging the limitations of the medium with the vivacity of a child who has just picked up a crayon for the first time. Unfortunately his energy runs out by the film’s coda, as the film’s more profound moments of revelation are played out profoundly stagey.

The obvious namecheck for ‘Hedwig and the Angry Inch’ is ‘Rocky Horror’, these being two of the very few films in the tradition of the glam-rock musical. But while ‘Rocky Horror’ rocked, and was infinitely fun in its own camp way, Hedwig is these things and more. It draws on a rich vein of insurgent Broadway musicals and blatantly invokes the spirit of Bob Fosse (eCabaret’, ‘All That Jazz’), only without the dancing. It is an intensely moving story, but at the same time it is more fun than any film in recent memory.

‘Hedwig’ won both the audience award and the judges award at Sundance, a rare moment for any festival when the crowd and the critics agree. It is an injection of adrenaline for jaded moviegoers, and a transgendered rock opus deservedly destined for cult status.