Hedwig and the Angry Inch

HEDWIG AND THE ANGRY INCH dir. John Cameron Mitchell, 2001. Cast: John Cameron Mitchell.

Format: Digital Projection. 1 hr 31 min. R

With this trailblazing musical, writer-director-star John Cameron Mitchell and composer-lyricist Stephen Trask brought their signature creation from stage to screen for a movie as unclassifiable as its protagonist. Raised a boy in East Berlin, Hedwig (Mitchell) undergoes a traumatic personal transformation in order to emigrate to the U.S., where she reinvents herself as an “internationally ignored” but divinely talented rock diva, characterized by Mitchell as inhabiting a “beautiful gender of one.” The film tells Hedwig’s story through her music, an eclectic assortment of original punk anthems and power ballads by Trask, and moments of bracing emotional realism. Hedwig and the Angry Inch is a tribute to the transcendent power of rock and roll.

Sponsored by Torrington Downtown Partners