| MOVIE
BIASES: Strong marketing campaign and Ced appears to be
in fine form.
MAJOR PLAYERS: Ice Cube (Torque), Cedric the Entertainer
(Intolerable Cruelty), and director Kevin Rodney Sullivan
(How Stella Got Her Groove Back)
 Building
off the breakout, low-budget hit "Barbershop,"
"Barbershop 2" is indeed "Back in Business."
Giving a hint at what's to come with an historical opening
sequence featuring Eddie's (Cedric) introduction to Calvin
Sr.'s barbershop, BS2 soon brings us up to the present,
with a fully committed Calvin Jr. (Cube) managing a successful,
people-oriented business cum-cultural hub of the community.
Between an anger management, Crystal-Lite version of Terri
(Eve), the once-rookie, now head case, all-star white barber
Isaac (Troy Garity), a thug life posing Ricky (Michael Ealy)
who's quietly trying to better himself, the lovelorn Dinka
(Leonard Earl Howze), and the endlessly riffing Eddie, Calvin
Jr.'s got his hands full. Well those hands just got fuller
when a wave of gentrification sweeps in the promise of a
hair cuttery chain across the street called Nappy Cutz,
which threatens to ruin not only Calvin's business but also
the soul of the community.
I have to admit that I liked the first "Barbershop,"
but didn't love it. I thought the dopey subplot with Anthony
Anderson and the ATM machine was an annoying (but necessary)
cutaway from the potentially static action at the shop.
But with BS2, flush with a doubled production budget (but
still small by Hollywood standards at an estimated $30 million),
bang-up script, and new director, MGM's hopes for a classy,
comedic, African-American franchise are gloriously fulfilled.
Sporting
a pudgy, mellowed-by-stardom 30ish demeanor, Ice Cube, perpetually
scowling yet not carrying the same threat of menace, is
appropriately the straight man center for this increasingly
diverse South Side Chicago world. Never quite the prankster
but never the butt of jokes either, Cube's Calvin Jr. has
been tempered by fatherhood, his eyes opened from the selfishness
of BS1Calvin to a genuine sense of communalism. The steely
Michael Ealy still carries the same baby-faced charm that
belies a flash of thug/street sense; Eve, thanks to her
weekly apprenticeship on her self-titled sitcom, has matured
into a (while not great, but at least) dependable actor;
Troy Garity plays his cocky, highly skilled barber with
just the right sense of bravado but also a sense of his
place - never the token, not quite a "brotha"
either, but still family; and Cedric is…well, Cedric.
Given second billing and more scenery to chew, Cedric revives
his "controversial" (so what if "Martin Luther
King was a ho!"), elder statesman role of Eddie with
the same notion for cutting up ("Trent Lott is the
poster child for stupid white men") and calling it
straight. But the best move of the movie was giving his
soulful yet loudmouthed Eddie a BACKSTORY. By weaving ongoing
flashbacks of the younger Eddie romancing the One That Got
Away (Garcelle Beauvais) as well as his seminal tie to the
survival of Calvin Sr.'s barbershop, the filmmakers have
grounded the movie in the pervasive theme of history and
tradition being the saving grace of the future. Can't know
where you're going if you don't know where you've been,
right?
Everyone here is better, mostly because they have a better
script with which to work, credited to Don D. Scott (Barbershop).
The script covers issues of loyalty, self-honesty, diversity,
community, commercial gentrification, and professional ethics
with the same ease as it does its easy-flowing, realistic
dialogue. Not only is it funny, but it's about something.
Where else would you find a comedy brave enough to take
R. Kelly, Kobe, Luther Vandross, the DC sniper, race riots,
and the Black Panthers head on - and extract gut-busting
laughs? And with the countdown to the opening of technologically
advanced, slickly stylish Nappy Cutz (complete with indoor
basketball court and giant fish tank) looming ominously
in the foreground, you truly invest in Calvin's hopeless
fight against a formidable behemoth he can't possibly beat.
But one of the most key additions is the director Kevin
Rodney Sullivan, who thankfully took over at the eleventh
hour for BS1's director Tim Story. It's as if the budding
franchise had a heart transplant, infusing the already well-polished
script with dollops of style and historical verve. His handling
of the actors is superb, too, allowing Kenan Thompson's
energetically annoying neophyte barber enough rope to hilariously
entertain but not enough to coonishly hang himself (or the
movie, for that matter). Thanks to innovative camerawork
by Tom Priestley Jr., hip (but not distractingly so) editing
by Paul Seydor, and creative shot selection that includes
a musical sequence of barbershop sound effects and numerous
aerial flybys of the Chicago South Side neighborhood whose
soul they are trying to preserve (in all fairness, Sullivan
had more cash to work with than Story did), Sullivan is
able to embrace the diversity of his subjects without losing
sight of the nuts and bolts of the story. Unerringly focused
on the themes of big versus small, change versus tradition,
corporate versus community, the director "edutains"
the audience in subtle ways. Take the heated, centerpiece
snappin' contest between Queen Latifah's Gina and Cedric's
Eddie, which is resolved in a peaceful, non-confrontational
manner, exploding the stereotype that black folks are more
violent than others.
As we have seen last year, bigger budget sequels do not
a hit make (ahem, "Matrix Revolutions"). Sure
there's more cash, product placement, and a stronger marketing
campaign, but the one thing that is often overlooked is
growth. Business 101: in order to open a franchise to expand
your business, you must accurately plan for growth. In BS2,
the characters' growth from the first one is evident but
still shows that they have miles to go, giving their arcs
somewhere to go in this movie. A deepening of core values
and raising of the stakes in the script is also a key indicator
of growth. Adding overall complexity and hidden backstories
to favorite characters we thought we had pegged shows that
this franchise-in-the-making continues to flourish.
Franchising aside, this is a fearless, confident MOVIE;
and finally a comedy that is truly representative of the
ever-shifting realities and intricacies of the black experience.
When I decried the state of "black film" last
year and how much I hated it in its present form, surprisingly,
many of you agreed. Well, I'm "decrying" no more.
If "Barbershop 2" is a harbinger of the greatness
ahead, then black film has just evolved.
@@@@ REELS
(FOUR REELS)
An urban legend/instant classic.
Like what you read? Agree/disagree with The Reel Deal? Think
he's talkin' out his...HUSH YO' MOUF! (I'm only talkin'
about The Reel Deal!) Email him at ReelReviewz@aol.com!
Edwardo Jackson is the author of the novels EVER AFTER and
NEVA HAFTA, (Villard/Random House), a writer for UrbanFilmPremiere.com,
and an LA-based screenwriter. Visit his website at www.edwardojackson.com
© 2004, Edwardo
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