Has anyone seen a real barbershop in the last ten years? Me neither, but apparently they still exist, and in the Black community they are important institutions. They stand as quasi-Black country clubs with a halfway house built in.

The barbershop of importance here is one in Chicago that is operated by Calvin Palmer (Ice Cube, All About the Benjamins), who inherited the shop from his father, who had also inherited it from his father. Problem is, Calvin wants to make it rich, but he keeps failing with all the get-rich-quick schemes (imagine that) while getting further in debt. You see, he wants to put his wife Jennifer (Jazsmin Lewis) in a big fancy house like Oprah got for Stedman. So now Calvin needs to come up with some cash to keep the bank from foreclosing on the barbershop, but the only one willing to lend him money is local criminal Lester Wallace (Keith David). So Calvin sells the place for 30 Gs to Lester who informs Calvin that he will be turning the place into a gentleman’s club, so now Calvin regrets selling his father’s legacy. For the rest of the day Calvin must deal with his demons and try to get his shop back, which now Lester is only willing to sell it back at the price of 50 Gs. Meanwhile, local losers JD (Anthony Anderson) and Billy (Lahmard Tate) have stolen the new ATM machine located at the convenience store across the street from Calvin’s barbershop. Later we learn, but they don’t, that the machine was so new that the money had not even been loaded into it. But the real story is how Calvin realizes what he is losing by selling the barbershop after spending the day listening to the people that come and go from the shop. This is instead of what he is usually  trying to do, which is make it rich monetarily. Most of this realization comes through interaction with his barbers Ricky (Michael Ealy, Bad Company), Terri Jones (Eve, XXX), Jimmy James (Sean Patrick Thomas, Save the Last Dance), Dinka (Leonard Earl Howze), Isaac (Troy Garity, Bandits), and old-timer Eddie (Cedric the Entertainer, Serving Sara). Each lends a different thread that helps to weave the fabric of the barbershop, which in turn represents the Black community as a whole, and once Calvin discovers this he gets drastic in his actions to save the shop.

A few others in this Tim Story film are Tom Wright, DeRay Davis, Sonya Eddy, Jason George, Saralynne Crittenden, plus a cameo from NBA star Jalen Rose. The story is the work of Mark Brown, who also wrote Two Can Play That Game.

Ice Cube plays a much different role than what we are used to seeing from him, and it works. Most of the comedy in the film comes from the supporting cast with kudos going to Cedric the Entertainer, Lahmard Tate, and Troy Garity. Barbershop is a really funny film that leaves time for the audience to learn a little about what institutions like a barbershop mean to the Black community’s. A good film all around that gets nine couches out of ten.

Last updated: Thursday, March 20, 2008 02:48:06 AM

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