Barbershop 2: Back In Business

The first Barbershop movie was a nice surprise, a low-key film interested in following one day’s events in and around the local barbershop. Most of its charm came from this simplistic premise and the movie thrived on humourous conversations about current events and relationships. Sure, there was a flimsy plot about Calvin (Ice Cube) selling his shop to gangsters, but the film wisely concentrated more on discovering the many unique characters. Sadly, Barbershop 2 spends most of its running time trying to involve the audience in a plot that is extremely bland.

You know the story...small privately owned business must try and face off against a behemoth company opening up across the road. Barbershop 2 pits Calvin’s Barbershop against a chain a Barber-super-stores called Nappy Cuts. The man behind the new hair cutting mega-palace is trying to buy out land in Calvin’s community and is getting help from the local Alderman. If this was the backdrop to more hilarious barbershop shenanigans it would be acceptable, but the movie quickly turns into Calvin’s crusade and forgets about most of the supporting characters. I wanted to get to know the many barbers better in the sequel, but aside from Eddie (Cedric the Entertainer) everyone else is given very little to do. Sean Patrick Thomas, who made a huge impression in the first movie with his holier than thou attitude, hardly gets a chance to expand on his character this time round. He’s off working for the Alderman while the audience is left watching a pointless cameo by Queen Latifah, who is essentially advertising her upcoming film Beauty Shop. Fortunately, there are still some entertaining barbershop conversations and Cedric the Entertainer has a series of amusing flashbacks (even if his romantic subplot falls flat on its face). I particularly enjoyed a scene exploring Eddie’s connection to the barbershop during the Martin Luther King riots. It’s certainly not a bad film, but by focusing on an overused generic plot, Barbershop 2 loses sight of its biggest asset - its characters.

The new DVD from MGM is well put together. The image is very sharp with vivid colours. As well the audio sounds very good, nicely mixing the dialogue and music tracks. A nice collection of special features rounds out the DVD. There are two commentaries; a humourous video commentary with members of the cast and a very informative audio commentary with the creative team of the movie. The second commentary details the challenges in making a sequel and discusses why several decisions were made. There is the usual mix of wisely deleted scenes (although some are pretty funny) and somewhat humourous outtakes as well. To top things off there are a couple of music videos related to the world of Barbershop.