Barbershop: The Next Cut Movie Review (2016 Movie)

Barbershop: The Next Cut Movie Review (2016 Movie)

Barbershop: The Next Cut the movie is a creative way of saying Barbershop Part 3 for anyone who has watched and remembers the first installment and the second of the movie series, Barbershop. In the plot of Barbershop: The Next Cut the movie, a decade has passed. The Barbershop that used to employ fewer female barbers is now a Unisex shop, where both men and women regularly go to get their hair done. The star of Barbershop: The Next Cut the movie is Ice Cube who plays the character Calvin.

In Barbershop: The Next Cut the movie, Calvin is the owner of Calvin’s Barbershop.

His female business partner is played by the actress Regina Hall and the business is quite bustling with both men and women getting their hair done.

• In Barbershop: The Next Cut the movie, the female rapper and actress Eve reprises her role from the first Barbershop movie and she is shown thanking Calvin for introducing her to his friend Rashon, a character played by rapper Common.
• In Barbershop: The Next Cut the movie, Eve’s character and Common’s character get married and have a child, a daughter named Mya. Common’s character also has an older son from a previous relationship and this son goes to live with his Dad and family.
• Eve’s character and a character named Draya, played by Nicki Minaj are at constant conflict because Draya frequently, inappropriately and brazenly flirts with Rashon.
• Hints are made about how someone that is so crudely trying to be the other woman really needs to get a life.

The setting of the movie, Barbershop: The Next Cut is the south side of Chicago.

Integral in the plot of the movie Barbershop: The Next Cut is the constant element of fear and uneasiness that the community is living in with the constant threat of getting caught in the crossfire of gang violence in the neighborhood. It is just incessant.

In Barbershop : The Next Cut the movie, the neighborhood where Calvin’s barbershop is located is disintegrating further and further into the stress of being surrounded by gang violence.

While Barbershop: The Next Cut is generally a comedy and a funny one at that, the way the characters of Barbershop: The Next Cut the movie come together to shine a light on the serious cause of reducing gang violence in the south side Chicago community is very poignant.

The actor Sean Patrick Thomas makes an appearance in Barbershop: The Next Cut the movie as the character Jimmy James, a local politician and occasional customer at the barbershop.

You might do a double take and say, hey, I know that actor. Where do I know him from? When you see Sean Patrick Thomas, you might be amazed at how great he looks, as I was. He looks fantastic and like he has not aged a bit since he appeared in the movie Save The Last Dance so many years ago (in the year 2000).

In Barbershop: The Next Cut the movie, the character Jimmy James, played by Sean Patrick Thomas, decides to go down to the shop in person to let the people know about plans for the building of an enclosure that will bog down traffic but will offer one way in and one way out of the area and this in itself can contribute in causing the gang violence to decrease.

In Barbershop : The Next Cut the movie, many of the people in the shop debate this and do not really agree with the information that Jimmy James is presenting. They think that it will be bad for business as well and that they will lose many customers at the barbershop. Jimmy James is sure to let them know that he is on their sides and he want the same thing that they want, a reduction in the gang violence.

Nevertheless, the various barbers and hairdressers at the barbershop mostly want to say no to the enclosure idea and they also want to encourage the coordination of a “cease fire” among gang members for a 48 hour period that falls on a weekend.

In Barbershop : The Next Cut the movie, the people working at the barbershop coordinate scheduling two gang leaders for their hair appointments on the same day when this is something that they would usually try to avoid instead.

In the movie, there is a scene with an intense moment of heightened animosity between the gang leaders confronting each other and trying to reach for their guns.

They have to be held back and calmed down by the other people in the shop and once they both get seated in chairs, Calvin presents his idea of having these two men use their influence as “shot callers” to get other gang members in the community to agree to the 48 hour cease fire.

The cease fire gets agreed upon, the mood lightens and everyone celebrates as they plan the weekend event of giving free haircuts and styling at the barbershop to get people off the streets, curb violence and call attention to that cause of reducing gang violence in the community.

Unfortunately and tragically, a clean cut young boy that had been employed part time at the barbershop with helping to clean up, gets killed during this weekend. Calvin feels defeated, frustrated and sad over the boy’s death. In his anger and frustration, he calls for a premature end to the event at the barbershop.

Calvin feels like their efforts at the barbershop have not been / are not making a difference and that the kids out there don’t care, that “they want to kill each other”. It is a devastating and dramatic scene and it is also revealed that Calvin and his wife put a down payment on a different barbershop store location on the north side of Chicago, where it is safer.

Calvin does not want to feel guilt tripped about his decision that he feels is for the safety of his own family including his only son, but he failed to let his business partner know his plans. The other people working at the barbershop did not know either and they all felt betrayed by Calvin.

In Barbershop : The Next Cut the movie, one of the movie characters, played by Cedric the Entertainer goes to sit next to the character Calvin at a bar that he goes to and they talk things out a bit. Eventually, Calvin comes around and is at least ready to continue the barbershop business’s cease fire event.

Everyone else is happy when they hear that the event can continue.

They even talk somewhat jokingly about trying to get the topic trending on Twitter (with basketball player and other celebrity influence, this eventually does happen for them, though much to their excitement and surprise).

In BARBERSHOP: THE NEXT CUT the movie, Common’s character Rashon’s son and Ice Cube’s character Calvin’s son, Jalen are very good friends and they are both vulnerable to the possibility of getting initiated into a gang.

It is pointed out though that they both have loving parents with loving homes where everything that they need is provided for them. Why are they so interested in possibly joining a gang? They shouldn’t be. Of course, no child should be but most typically / statistically it has been shown that it is the kids that do not have supportive families or a sense of belonging who might get caught up in joining gangs for money, protection and a feeling of belonging to a “family”.

While Rashon’s son was the more wayward one at first, having gotten expelled from his previous school because of fighting, he is also the one that is more quick to realize that he needs to drop his interest in joining a gang.

Once an initiation occurs, these gang members use intense intimidation to ensure that the newest gang member remains with them for life. Rashon’s son tries to show Calvin’s son that they both need to avoid getting involved in this kind of commitment.

• The head of the gang that they have been contemplating joining is played by the rapper Tyga, very convincingly and in an intimidating way indeed.
• Calvin’s son, Jalen is brave enough to go to see the gang leader face to face and let him know that he will not be getting involved in the gang after all.
• The gang leader played by Tyga laments that Jalen is “wasting [his] time” and will he be riding with them tonight or not? It is really quite an intense scene. What will happen to Calvin’s son, Jalen for defying the gang leader?
• Well, in Barbershop : The Next Cut the movie, Calvin himself shows up to rescue his son. Nevertheless, he does not have to do anything more than pick him up from the park location in his car because his son has already taken care of declaring his loss of interest in joining the gang and sending two large cars full of gang members on their way. Can it really happen that way in real life? The audience might wonder.

By the end of the film, Barbershop: The Next Cut, (perhaps because of the popularity that they gained on Twitter and other social media?) the workers at the barbershop get an unexpected surprise visit from the President of the United States at the time, President Obama who talks about his roots in the south side of Chicago.

The movie Barbershop: The Next Cut ends with everyone’s celebratory excitement for being able to meet the President.

Barbershop: The Next Cut the movie

I rate Barbershop: The Next Cut the movie 3 out of 5 stars.

Rated PG-13, some crude humor and language

The Barbershop: The Next Cut film also touches a lot on current events and controversies of the time with dialogue that discusses people from Bill Cosby to R. Kelly.

Barbershop: The Next Cut the movie is starring Ice Cube, Common, Eve, Cedric the Entertainer, Nicki Minaj, Regina Hall, Tyga, Sean Patrick Thomas and others (well known actors and rappers in an “all star” cast)