It has been twelve years since we visited Calvin (Ice Cube) and his barbershop in the South Side of Chicago. Much has happened to the neighborhood, especially of late with gun violence claiming lives practically every single day without prejudice to age or gender. If there was a time to make another Barbershop movie and interweave the classic comedy with a timely message that informs while it entertains, it is now.
The makers of Barbershop: The Next Cut could not have hit the nail on the head more perfectly than they did with the third film in the series. Directed by Malcolm D. Lee, from a script by Kenya Barris and Tracy Oliver, the film explores some serious issues that are as pertinent to Chicago as any American city, all while providing some serious laughs delivered by comedic actors working at the top of their game.
Cube is our leader as Calvin and as he opens his shop on this particular weekend, the laughs are aplenty from the likes of Cedric the Entertainer, J.B. Smoove (who practically steals the movie!), Nicki Minaj, Anthony Anderson, Lamorne Morris and yes, even Common. Also returning is Eve and joining the series in the now-coed barbershop is Regina Hall and Jazsmin Lewis.
But what is ever present is the gang violence that sometimes finds itself trying to rear its head in Calvin’s shop. Two rival gangs are fighting over turf and both of the group’s leaders get their hair done at the barbershop. When each wind up at the shop at the same time (a scheduling error that almost explodes into a violent situation), the crew at the shop come up with an idea: A cease-fire in the city with the barbershop in the middle offering free hair cuts as a condition of no violence in the city over the course of one particular weekend.
Many films have tried to weave humor and a message and few have done so as effectively and entertainingly as Barbershop: The Next Cut. What’s going on in Chicago is about as serious as current events can be, and some films have tried to explore the message (most notably Spike Lee’s Chi-Raq) and who would have thought that it would be the third film in a Barbershop series that would hit all the right notes on so many levels?
Yet, it does and all the while it manages to strike some other fantastical chords as well.
For one, Calvin is a father to a teenage boy who he and his mother are trying to keep on the straight and narrow. Even though the child has all he needs in terms of love and material things, he is still drawn to the gang life and Calvin feels that his grip on his son his slowly slipping away. Who cannot relate to that aspect of parenthood and the minefield that many find their children navigating in today’s world. Barbershop: The Next Cut handles it with truth and love in a way that is not preachy, condescending or even too light for a film that is a comedy at its core.
There is also battle of the sexes issues that are confronted throughout that too manages to ring true. Melding a beauty shop and the barbershop together not only makes business sense for Calvin in the film itself, but also from a plot perspective it expands what the film can achieve when it comes to the ever changing relationship between men and women in this evolving times.
Would you believe that in a film that clocks in at less than two hours also manages to tackle one other aspect of our society at large: politics! Yup, not all those who visit the barbershop believe that President Obama is doing all he can for the community. Some love the man and believe he belongs up there with some of the greats in the Civil Rights movement. Yet, there are some that think that for a man from the streets of Chicago should have been able to do more to prevent the type of killing that is plaguing the city on a daily basis. It’s a fascinating wrinkle to this comedy that handles all of its issues with grace, power and more importantly, yes, humor.
Cube knew that if they were to return to the Barbershop series for another film, there had to be a reason. As the credits roll, one realizes how cinematically intelligent he is because what we have in Barbershop: The Next Cut is a film that gives us a multitude of reasons to head on it to get our hair did, laugh a lot and presents us much to think about long after we leave.
Grade: A-