Hedwig and the Angry Inch

Pros: Acting, costumes, music, story...

Cons: Definitely not family entertainment...

The Bottom Line: A wonderful story, a wonderful picture. Hedwig reminds us that in order to love others, you must first love yourself.

Review: John Cameron Mitchell’s vibrant, visionary Hedwig and the Angry Inch (2001) follows the life of a rock and rolling East German by the name of Hansel from childhood through the moment he truly comes to accept himself as unique. Escaping with his ...

Pros: great music in a creative comedy

Cons: we wonder how they could ever possibly get booked in those terrible Red Lobster restaurants

The Bottom Line: a driving well-done visual treat from a stage play by the writer/star

Review: We watch films and are attracted to certain movies because we look for ourselves; we look for someone to identify with to say “That’s me”. Hedwig hits the viewer in such a vulnerable spot that anyone watching the film, regardless of his orientation ...

Pros: Mitchell, Cast, Music, Everything, & the Music.

Cons: Can't Think of Anything Bad.

The Bottom Line: "Hedwig & the Angry Inch" is an Amazing Musical of Glam Rock Sheer & Satire led by the Glorious Mind of John Cameron Mitchell.

Review: Musicals have always been a genre people either love or hate, even if it’s in Broadway. While recently, “Chicago” brought the musical back into the silver screen after winning Best Picture, the musical is still a genre some have a hard time to ...

Pros: Immense vitality & élan; awesome soundtrack; strikingly original concept & well-developed characters

Cons: The ending might seem obtuse; Gummi Bears gross me out!

The Bottom Line: If you don't think you'd have anything in common with a struggling transsexual punk rocker from East Berlin, ho-ho, you're in for a big surprise.

Review: Got your mother in a whirl
She's not sure if you're a boy or a girl -- David Bowie

At some time in your life, you may have "walked on the wild side" - or perhaps you live on the wild side. Or maybe you've always played it...

Pros: Poignant story, comic timing, imaginative story sequencing/direction, catchy rock music.

Cons: Not for the literal or linear-minded.

The Bottom Line: Like all my favorite love stories seem to be, this one is very strange. But like all of them, it's as true as well-written lies get.

Review: I assume -- and i promise this will relate to Hedwig and the Angry Inch in a paragraph or two -- that on September 11th, 2001, roughly fifty or so Americans died in car wrecks. A typical day's auto-wreck death-count would be a hundred Americans,...

Pros: Mitchell, the music, the live performance and the dialogue.

Cons: that it took me so long to see it.

The Bottom Line: It's like Pink Floyds "The Wall" with better music, hair, clothes and none of the pretension!

Review: I knew hardly anything about this film until just recently when a friend got me to watch it. I did know that it was a rock n' roll broadway play brought to the big screen about a transvestite and that everyone that thought they were "cutting edge" loved ...

Pros: Brilliant performances, script, songs and cinematography.

Cons: If you are STRICTLY a "mainstream" cinema fan, you may think Hedwig is weird.

The Bottom Line: "Hedwig and the Angry Inch" crosses cultural boundaries to present a classic tale of the undying search for satisfaction within the human heart

Review: In some respects the general public sometimes divides films into two types: "gay movie" and "not gay movie". To the casual viewer any film that centers around gay, lesbian, bisexual or transexual characters is automatically a "gay movie" and thus ...

Pros: The music is enjoyable, great performance by John Cameron Mitchell, great script

Cons: Supporting cast not developed enough

The Bottom Line: Hedwig is lovable, both the script and the music are campy and enjoyable, John Cameron Mitchell gives a great performance.

Review: What makes for a classic musical? Well, good songs, likable, if somewhat off beat, strong willed characters who remain true to themselves and amusing supporting cast. Some reasonably good dance movements. Add to that, fun campy lines that suggest 'you ...

Pros: Powerhouse performances, music and direction

Cons: None worth mentioning

The Bottom Line: Part ROCKY HORROR, part TOMMY, HEDWIG AND THE ANGRY INCH is a rebirth for the movie musical: stunning, hypnotic and one hundred percent original. See it!

Review: In a cinematic age in which movie musicals have gone the way of ducks in winter (which is to say, south), we have been subjected to several movies that pretend to be musicals (FLASHDANCE anyone?) but which do not deliver the goods. Only Alan Parker,...

Pros: wonderfully countercultural, good nuanced relationships, cast is talented (and HOT)

Cons: no linear plot, a little pretentiously artsy (but it can afford to be)

The Bottom Line: You're looking at what, hopefully, is the future of musical theater's translation to the screen. Beautiful, theatrical, and innovative.

Review: There were two things that occurred to me as I was watching Hedwig: one is that music, these days, is about as dull and dreary and itchin' for a backlash as it was back in the mid-seventies and again in the late eightees; and the other is that,...