“Barbershop” is a smart, clever, and well-written piece of filmmaking that stars an ensemble cast of predominant African American actors, all talented. Ice Cube is Calvin Palmer, the son of a beloved barber who inherits his father’s old barbershop and takes it for granted mostly running the shop for his father’s sake, viewing it as a waste of time and money. But when he has aspirations of starting a record company, he secretly sells it to local neighborhood loan shark Lester Wallace and slowly begins moving everything out from under the employees who have a bond, and function as a family. I was surprised with this film, because of the screenplay which invokes a large array of truly hilarious and likable characters.
Shanghai Knights (2003)
The numbskull duo from the bland action yarn “Shanghai Noon” return for yet another vehicle sequel “Shanghai Knights.” I was not a fan of the original film, I thought it was yet another bland vehicle for Wilson and Chan who seem to only be charismatic and funny when paired with a complete opposite. This sequel didn’t prove to be anything new or innovative as well; it was just an endless sequence of comedic dialogue, fight scene, comedic dialogue, fight scene, and so on, so it’s obvious I felt jumbled by the sloppy story and cheap plot devices.
5ive Days to Midnight (2004)
Timothy Hutton plays physics professor JT Neumeyer, a prominent professor and widow who is very close to his daughter. One her birthday he and his daughter go to visit his wife’s grave and discovers a thin silver brief case only a few feet away that shows up seemingly from thin air. He takes it home out of curiosity and tucks it away, but the curiosity gets the best of him. He opens it and discovers a group of files showing pictures of his death and newspapers clippings. First declaring this as a practical joke from one of his students or colleagues, he sets it aside, but as the days progress, the events in the files play out slowly but surely, and now convinced that he’ll die in five days, tries to find a way to prevent himself from dying and must change his destiny. Plus, he must also find out who out of his friends, family, or colleagues will murder him.
"Mean Girls" Soundtrack (Digital)
Though I’ve yet to see the hit film “Mean Girls” I was fortunate enough to listen to the soundtrack. While my ventures into the soundtrack genre as of late has been lackluster, I was rather optimistic upon viewing the track list. Simply: I enjoyed this because it was a lot of fun. Obviously, aimed mostly at young girls ages 13-18 (parents break out your wallets!), this fluffy soundtrack to the critically acclaimed hit film “Mean Girls” will surely leave you with a cavity with the inoffensive songs, and catchy pop anthems sung by predominantly female recording artists.
Head of State (2003)
This reminded me a lot of the Robert Redford vehicle “The Candidate” which was smart, witty and funny, but the difference between the two is that ultimately, this was much dumber, vapid, very derivative, and pretends to be a political satire when it’s just another Chris Rock vehicle. In this very far-fetched fairy tale, we meet May Gilliam a small time politician for the inner city of Washington DC who works for the people despite the fact we never actually see him at any rallies, holding any conferences or talking with any other politicians and he’s still pretty poor. He claims he wants to work for the people and help the people out yet never actually makes a difference in office. Hell, there’s even a scene that mimics “Harry and Tonto” where a woman refuses to leave her building which is about to be demolished because she can’t find her cat.
The Last Samurai (2003)
This elegant love letter to the samurai and to the old world Japanese culture takes place in the late 1800’s, the civil war era, an ex-confederate soldier Captain Nathan Algren, a drunken has been is tortured by his past after being forced to slaughter an Indian village during Custer’s last stand is now a has been who advertises guns for the Winchester company until he’s approached by friend Zebulon Grant played very poignantly by Billy Connolly who makes an offer to Algren to re-claim his respect as a soldier and take a job from the Japanese government to modernize their army to fight against the rebels, an army of Samurai’s, a dying breed from the old world, who are being led by a mysterious leader known as Katsumoto.
A Guy Thing (2003)
Jason Lee is a prime example of a very talented actor who has the chops to make primo movies yet consistently star in cinematic fecal matter such as “A Guy Thing”. Lee continues starring in half-baked terrible films like “Dreamcatcher” and “Stealing Harvard” and continues to waste the talents he presents in his past films. “A Guy Thing” has the plot of a sitcom with a storyline done to death and is inevitably doomed to the fate of posing as an hour and a half long big screen commercial sitcom and is just as bland. Lee has shown promise in films like “Chasing Amy”, “Dogma” and the excellent “Almost Famous” in which he managed to steal most of the scenes he was in, but Lee has proved that though he’s excellent as a supporting actor, he just can’t hack it as a leading man yet.