Barbershop (2002)
Dir. Tim Story
Written by Marc Brown
Starring: Ice Cube, Cedric the Entertainer, Eve
Eddie: See, in my day, a barber was more than just somebody who sit around in a FUBU shirt with his drawers hanging all out. In my day, a barber was a counselor. He was a fashion expert. A style coach. Pimp. Just general all-around hustler. But the problem with y'all cats today, is that you got no skill. No sense of history. And then, with a straight face, got the nerve to want to be somebody. Want somebody to respect you. But it takes respect to get respect. Understand? See, I'm old. But, Lord willing, I'd be spared the sight of seeing everything that we worked for flushed down the drain by someone who don't know no better or care.
I have to begin by prefacing this piece with the fact that I am biracial. Or maybe multi-racial is a more appropriate term. Why do I have to express this right off the bat? Because the complicated mystory/herstory that descends from my background gifts me with slightly different view than those who don’t have my background. I struggle with my ethnic identity much as I imagine most people do and even though I identify as both “black” and “white” I know intellectually that I don’t fully understand what these terms mean and probably never will. Whewww…glad to get that out of the way, basically I have a love and hate relationship with films that could be termed African-American films; especially comedies where I literally laugh and cringe simultaneously. Al Sharpton had a few things to say about this film because Cedric the Entertainer makes several jokes that denigrate Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks.
Eddie(Cedric): There are three things that Black people need to tell the truth about. Number one: Rodney King should've gotten his ass beat for being drunk in a Honda a white part of Los Angeles. Number two: O.J. did it! And number three: Rosa Parks didn't do nuthin' but sit her Black ass down!
and then the film does question itself as well:
Jimmy: Eddie, not only is what you're saying not true, it is wrong and disrespectful for you to discuss Rosa Parks in that way.
Eddie: Wait, hold on here. Is this a barbershop? Is this a barbershop? If we can't talk straight in a barbershop, then where can we talk straight? We can't talk straight nowhere else. You know, this ain't nothin' but healthy conversation, that's all.
I think the question of “going to far” concerning comedy will be one that forever exists. When does it stop being funny and hint at deeper social issues or does the fact that it has entered the arena of comedy mean that there has been some progress? I don’t know—and I think that these issues are way too big for little old me.
I found an article that wrote about an interview done on CNN with Ice Cube, the main protagonist in the film, he was there to be interviewed as a rapper but what he says speaks to what I’ve written above. He said:
* “In response to a question as to whether or not rap bears any “social message,” Ice Cube was careful to make a distinction between the occasions when rappers were “just having fun” and the times when they were performing a more serious “social message.” His distinction between informal “play” and more formal “message,” he argued, was apparent to the kids who could “tell the difference” even when their parents couldn’t. He defended rap music’s accountability for what is often seen as violent lyrics by comparing the violence of rap to the violence of film representation “[i]n movies like Terminator and Heat,” for example, “where the violence is visually represented.” Ice Cube’s defense implies that, similar to the violence in films, the linguistic violence in rap music should be taken as representation—performance, play, and perhaps even social message all at the same time; a “theatrical” rather than a supposedly objective or mimetic CNN—and that the performance should not be confused with the performer.”
is that they key? Putting “the performance” in it’s place and not confusing it with the performer?
Barbershops are the property of men; they provide a service to men usually performed by men. It is complicated space, essentially no girls aloud so I’ve never actually been inside one. I remember my brothers used to go to one and come back after a relatively short time (from my perspective—sometimes I would literally be at the hairdresser for five to seven hours, many times they broke combs on my curly/frizzy hair) not looking much different than when they went, having the “edges” done and other mysterious things done that I thought was a waste of time and money. My young self didn’t yet understand that it was more a rite or ritual of African-American manhood or boyhood than anything else.
I was trying to think of what kind of Screwball Comedy or even what genre this could be compared to and nothing was coming to mind until I saw the end of the film. It reminded of a Frank Capra movie, actually, it has the comedy along with some melodrama. Although Barbershop has a few PG-13 rated moments it still is about family, doing what is right, and having the right values. The ending of the movie is schmaltzy and reinforces the qualities listed above. Capra was known for these kind of patriotic, about the “common man,” and generally corny and sentimental films. Capra directed two movies that had definite screwball tendencies; the most famous is It Happened One Night, and Arsenic and Old Lace. Barbershop can be compared to Capra’s film because it is a comedy with heart or soul rather, it idealizes nostalgia and the credo that if you work hard you can attain the American Dream, while also saying that if you go the other route you will be unsuccessful.
I don’t have much to say about language in this film. It is mostly composed of insults exchanged back and forth between the barbershop crew. I will end with a quote because I feel ill equipped to write about the complicated issues that arise when talking about African-American Language. Dr. Geneva Smitherman, a linguist and educator, known for her advocacy of African-American English; she has written several books on the history and significance of African-American English.
**“Let’s rap/wrap it up. Docta G has shown that Black folk have always already been pushin the language envelope. Black folk have been fightin on all fronts, the physical, geopolitical, metaphysical, philosophical, aesthetic, religious, political, ideological, psychological, spiritual, symbolic, economic, hermeneutic, academic, linguistic, iconic, and more. Through all of these wars, we have managed to maintain a sense of ethics, humanity, dignity, and sanity. Damn! We talkin bout folk who simply refuse to die. Don’t even talk about givin up! What manner of people DO WE BE? Protean. Always already in struggle, al- ways already beginning some new shit, conceptualizing some new order of things, some other/alternative/unheard of/unimagined/ unexplored reality and mode of being. We bees doin da unthinkable. Must be magical and real. We always pushin. Whether its remaking and reconfiguring some superimposed language, creating musical instruments from some old found object, doctoring up a traditional in- strument, because you know we gotta hear that twang and chromatic sound, or pushin the bounds of what it means to be human and democratic, we up on it, way out in front. Blusing. Bopping. Moving. Rapping. Hip Hopping. Historicizing. Morphing. Always in the process of red-shifting, even when we be down. And, yes, LANGUAGING. We are still in process. What next? Can’t be sho. But I’ll C U when WE get there. As Docta G says, stay tuned”
*Rap's Unruly Body The Postmodern Performance of Black Male Identity on the American Stage by Saddik, Annette J.
TDR: The Drama Review, Volume 47, Number 4 (T 180), Winter 2003, pp. 110-127
** Geneva Smitherman: The Social Ontology of African-American Language, the Power of Nommo, and the Dynamics of Resistance and Identity Through Language by Yancy, George.
The Journal of Speculative Philosophy, New Series, Volume 18, Number 4, 2004, pp. 273-299
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