Beauty Shop (If you're female)

This is a relatively decent movie if you're female, otherwise it falls in the two star range. Meaning: if your girlfriend drags you to this movie with her then you won't leave with your ears bleeding, but nevertheless it does feature a bunch of women cutting hair and talking about, I dunno...girl stuff I guess.

So Gina (Queen Latifah) is this super awesome hair stylist, and she takes a job at a chique salon working for Jorge (Kevin....Bacon? What? Does his agent owe someone money or something?). Anyway, Jorge is a big meanie-head, so Gina quits and then pursues her dream to buy her own shop. Which she does. And um, that's it!

Gina spends the rest of the movie struggling to keep her new business afloat, which is difficult given that she has to revamp the entire shop that she bought, hire a handsome electrician who can also double as the romantic interest, and still manage to pay the tuition for her daughter's art school. Which she does. So you fill in the rest of the movie with scenes in the beauty shop where all the stylists and customers talk about stuff. Actually, Queen Latifah is incredibly charismatic as an actress, so her character Gina is also very likeable. Come to think of it, I enjoyed all the performances by the cast in this movie--it was pretty well put together. There are also some pretty funny scenes and dialogue here and there, but this movie wasn't quite as funny as the first predecessor, Barbershop. Still, I found myself laughing fairly often.

One part that irritated me, however, was the handling of the white character, Lynn (Alicia Silverstone). Initially, none of the women (save Gina of course) like Lynn all that much, as she is the lone white stylist. This is of course, similar to Barbershop's white barber trying to gain acceptance. That movie actually delved into real issues of race, and the conflict was then resolved in a realistic way without diminishing the weight of the issue. This resolution, however, did just that. All it takes is for Lynn to change her hairstyle and all the black characters will then accept her. Are you kidding me? Somehow, I don't think that people's emotions about race can be broken down into what kind of hairstyle you have.

Anyway, this movie is decent, probably more likeable if you're female, but nonetheless it wasn't half-bad. Funny, great characters, and a basically fun film to see. Yes, even if your girlfriend is making you see it with her.