Beauty Shop tells the story of Gina (Queen Latifah)
as she moves to Atlanta so her daughter can go to an exclusive music
school. She finds a job as a stylist at a high end salon but after a
confrontation with her boss leaves and opens her own beauty shop.
Beauty
Shop doesn’t quite rise to the occasion as it repackages and
regurgitates characters, themes and plots that we have seen before. It
is one thing to tell a story that has previously been done yet bring
something new to what may be an overdone but entertaining storyline and
it is another to retell a story and not bring anything new to the table
at all. Beauty Shop falls into the latter category and suffers greatly
for it.
The main problem with Beauty Shop is that it is Barber
Shop with women. From the plot twists to the characters inside the shop,
it is the exact same movie as Barbershop except with Queen Latifah at
the helm instead of Ice Cube. There is the funny, familial and penny
pinching boss, Gina (Queen Latifah). There is the misguided, yet full of
potential stylist in training, Darnelle (Keshia Knight-Pulliman).
There’s the arrogant, know it all stylist who is a pain in everyone’s
side, Chanel (Golden Brooks). There’s the novice stylist of a different
race that can’t get any business, Lynn (Alicia Silverstone) and finally
there’s the opposite sex stylist who is the only one of his kind in the
salon, James (Bryce Wilson). Add to that the money problems, someone
trying to take over the business and the possibility that the shop may
have to close for good and you have the same movie, same story without
any added flare. You even have the character that hawks their goods at
the shop: in Barbershop it was a man selling bootleg CDs and DVDs and in
Beauty Shop it is a woman selling catfish and monkey bread. The concept
of being original must have never crossed the writer’s minds.
And
once again I say, can we dispense with the gay stylists. That is a
stereotype that can go to the stereotype graveyard never to be seen or
heard of again…ever. Kevin Bacon, an actor I love does an absolutely
horrible and I repeat horrible job playing Latifah’s gay and fascist
boss. We can also dispense with "metrosexuals" the new overused and
unfunny effeminate male stereotype that is going to appear in every
movie where men are employed in what are typically considered to be
women’s jobs. If so, I say please stop now before you make audiences
suffer anymore then we already have at this new, unnecessary caricature.
There was one of these characters in "Guess Who", and one of Beauty
Shop’s many subplots is trying to figure out if the only male stylist is
gay, straight or a metrosexual which would be a cross between the two.
For
positives, there were some laughs and the opportunity to see a
shirtless Djimon Hounsou was almost worth my money, but overall Beauty
Shop was unoriginal and a bore. Ultimately the question is -- do you
really want to spend your money on something you’ve already seen before.
For me the answer is simple: No, I don’t.
