Cable networks like Showtime are diving into risky material that mainstream movie-makers shy away from--and Soldier's Girl demonstrates the payoff of such risks. Barry Winchell (Troy Garity, Barbershop), new to an infantry base in Tennessee, gets taken to a nightclub for drag performers by an obnoxious fellow soldier, Fisher (Shawn Hatosy, Outside Providence). There he meets Calpernia (Lee Pace), a transgendered performer, and feels an immediate attraction. But as Winchell's relationship with Calpernia develops, his relationship with the repressed Fisher grows dangerous to his career in the military--and possibly to his life. Based on a true story, Soldier's Girl tackles its delicate subject matter directly but respectfully, with compassion and intelligence. Garity, Pace, and Hatosy all turn in compelling, complex performances, steering clear of stereotypes. Director Frank Pierson (screenwriter of Dog Day Afternoon) skillfully avoids easy answers or obvious solutions and was deservedly nominated for an Emmy as a result. --Bret Fetzer
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The Showtime original movie SOLDIER'S GIRL tells the heartwrenching true story of Private Barry Winchell (Troy Garity, son of Jane Fonda and Tom Hayden), a 21-year-old soldier beaten to death in army barracks because of his love affair with a transgendered nightclub singer. The ostensibly heterosexual Winchell meets Calpernia Adams (Lee Pace) while out on the town with his infantry buddies and surprises even himself when he decides to date the vulnerable pre-op transsexual. But as the relationship blossoms, it infuriates Winchell's mentally unstable roommate Justin Fisher (Shawn Hatosy), who incites fellow soldier Calvin Glover (Philip Eddolls) to murder Winchell with a baseball bat. A scathing indictment of the codified machismo and homophobia that permeate military life, SOLDIER'S GIRL is also a sweet and tender story of a love that transcends boundaries.
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They didn't know how dangerous love could be.
Soldier's Girl is based on the true story of a young soldier, Barry Winchell, who falls in love with a transgendered nightclub performer. When this romance is revealed to his fellow soldiers, violent passions and aggressions are stirred and the lives of all the soldiers are changed forever.
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