Hedwig and the Angry Inch (2001)

User Rating:

7.6/10   

Director:

John Cameron Mitchell

Writers (WGA):

John Cameron Mitchell (book) and
Stephen Trask (book) ...

Release Date:

27 July 2001 (Canada)

Genre:

Comedy | Drama | Music

Tagline:

An anatomically incorrect rock odyssey

Plot:

A transexual punk rock girl from East Berlin tours the US with her rock band as she tells her life story and follows the ex-boyfriend/bandmate who stole her songs.

Plot Keywords:

Rock Band | Sex Change | Reference To Adam And Eve | Transvestism | Betrayal

Awards:

Nominated for Golden Globe. Another 27 wins & 27 nominations

Cast

John Cameron Mitchell	...	Hedwig
Miriam Shor	...	Yitzhak
Stephen Trask	...	Skszp - Band Member
Theodore Liscinski	...	Jacek - Band Member
Rob Campbell	...	Krzysztof - Band Member
Michael Aronov	...	Schlatko - Band Member
Andrea Martin	...	Phyllis Stein
Ben Mayer-Goodman	...	Hansel - 6 years old
Alberta Watson	...	Hansel's Mom
Gene Pyrz	...	Hansel's Dad
Michael Pitt	...	Tommy Gnosis
Karen Hines	...	Tommy's Publicist
Max Toulch	...	Goth Menses Boy
Maurice Dean Wint	...	Sgt. Luther Robinson
Ermes Blarasin	...	Fat Man

Also Known As:

Hedwig and the Angry Inch (Canada: French title) (France) [fr]
Hedwig (Argentina) (video title) [es]
Hedwig - La diva con qualcosa in più (Italy) [it]
Hedwig - Rock, Amor e Traição (Brazil) [pt]
Hedwig and the Angry Inch (Greece) [el]
Hedwig y the Angry Inch (Spain) [es]

MPAA:

Rated R for sexual content and language.

Runtime:

95 min | Argentina:93 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English | German

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

DTS | Dolby Digital | SDDS

Certification:

Iceland:L | Portugal:M/16 | USA:R (certificate #37948) | Argentina:16 | Netherlands:12 | Norway:11 | Singapore:NC-16 | South Korea:15 | Spain:13 | Sweden:11 | Switzerland:16 (canton of Geneva) | Switzerland:16 (canton of Vaud) | UK:15 | Australia:MA

Filming Locations:

The Eaton Center, Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Company:

Killer Films

Trivia:

During the "Wig in the Box" song, when Hedwig picks up the photo of herself as a young boy off a book, the books title can be seen as "Edge of Awareness".

Goofs:

Continuity: During the sequence in the trailer where the wall drops, the first shot shows the window on which Hedwig is stepping is closed. The second clearly shows it open by the curtain bowing towards the ground, and the third shows it closed once again.

Quotes:

Hedwig: [voiceover] He sang me songs.
Tommy: Classics.
Hedwig: [voiceover] The bands were new to me: Boston, Kansas, America, Europe, Asia.
Hedwig: [stops Tommy from playing his guitar] Travel exhausts me.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Another Gay Movie (2006)

Soundtrack:

Exquisite Corpse

astoundingly brilliant, somewhat disturbing. A must see.

This was a film I had planned to watch for an extremely long time, it was lent to me by an ethics professor and I was blown away. I was astounded. Never could I have imagined how visually and sonically pleasing Hedwig would be all at once, yet surprisingly disturbing. And this is coming from a homosexual man who has spent an enormous amount of time around persons who have had sex changes, and innumerable drag queens. Hedwig also gave a startling new look at the collapse of (and years previous to) the Berlin wall. EVEN IF YOU THINK YOU WON'T LIKE THIS FILM SEE IT ANYWAY, you will be surprised. What I took that was even more unexpected than anything else, was great joy in the songs. Each song, particularly "The Origin Of Love", and "Angry Inch" were songs I would listen to without prompting from the film.