Alicia I love this movie so much

AniInterview Sorry, this movie sucks

ChanFamous I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.

Kaelan Mccaffrey Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

tieman64 Part Michael Shultz's "Car Wash", part Kevin Smith's "Clerks", part Robert Altman's "Five and Dime", Tim Story's "Barbershop" is an intermittently interesting comedy revolving around a band of African Americans who gather at a South Chicago barbershop to work, chat, hangout and gossip.Forget the film's tired plot; that's just there to hold things together. All that matters in a film like this is that the characters we're forced to hang out with are a likable bunch, and along these lines the film works well. There's barbershop owner Calvin (Ice Cube), local gangster Lester, and Eddie, a funny old timer played by Cedric the Entertainer. The rest of the cast are a colourful assortment of West African poets, small time crooks, no-good boyfriends, racially insecure white boys and East Indian shop owners. Like the aforementioned films, this loosely structured comedy is less about plot than it is about lazily hanging out with a jovial ensemble cast. Cedric the Entertainer steals the show as an opinionated black man who bashes everyone from Rodney King to Rosa Parks.7.9/10 – Worth one viewing.

ponyfan I've read more than one review saying that this was mainly a movie for black people, mainly because of cultural in jokes. There were plenty of references to and clever banter about quite a few issues that a lot of people would expect in a movie featuring mostly "black" people (including Ice Cube), though I often have trouble with US accents, I'm not a massive fan of US rap in general and my skin's pretty pasty, and it seemed pretty straight forward to me... The movie should appeal to anyone that likes an intelligent comedy that doesn't take itself too seriously and has some heart. Anthony Anderson cracked me up and so did Cedric. First and foremost the movie is about people and the value of communities compared to the cold world ruled by the $. Most of the characters were "real" and the shonky ones were made believable- great cast and fluent acting. A movie for the sort of people that have wondered how hard it would be to knock off an ATM :)

Mikelito Not every movie can be entirely original. But it's annoying to see obvious rip-offs from other movies combined with a lack of talent for story-telling (or in this case scene-telling). Obvious references which are simply taken and copied only with much lesser intelligence are: Coming to America, Big Lebowski, Do The Right Thing, Carwash, etc. For instance the car smashing scene: It isn't even done well, the guy takes forever to notice that his car is being smashed, then he runs out on the street and there isn't a single funny line. The scene is straight out of Big Lebowski (a movie I didn't like and found less original than almost everyone else but at least there was some craft involved in the making of that particular movie). And this happens all the time: people talk and do the most obvious things. No twists, no clever dialogue, just a shallow and flat deliverance. It sometimes even feels as if there was no script at all. People seem to have a general idea of a scene then just went along to see if anything (funny) would happen. It's all good and fine to try to capture alleged everyday life but this requires a skill. The "jokes" throughout the movie have Police Academy quality. i.e. they are primitive, slap-sticky and have been seen a million times. Fat guys are just fat and that is supposedly funny enough. For them to quote and make fun of Rosa Parks, MLK has absolutely no reason or twist or whatever. At one point in the movie guys talk about being entitled to reparation payments like Jews for the Holocaust. It's mystifying what all these touchy subjects that appear out of nowhere in the movie are supposed to be doing for a film that seems to want to be a light-hearted snap-shot of some inner city neighbourhood.It seems someone just wanted to cram every possible subject into a setting without rounding if off in any way thinking you can just loosely tie together scenes and ideas (from others), then mix in a few controversial subjects and voilà: Here's your masterpiece. Well: it didn't work.

roxy_quiksilver_12 Relationships vs. Money In Barbershop, having good friends and sticking together is better than money because money can't buy happiness and because friendship lasts forever. Furthermore, Calvin wanting Oprah's guest house for his wife isn't going to make her happy.I've watched Barbershop quite a few times. It's one of my favorite movies and that's why I chose to do my MMR on it. Actually thinking about the meaning of the movie is something I don't normally do after watching a movie, but this time I did.When I said "Calvin wanting Oprah's guest house for his wife isn't going to make her happy," I meant that Calvin thought if he sold the barbershop for enough money and bought his wife a huge house then she would be happy. He was so wrapped up in the thought of money and himself he wasn't thinking about how great the barbershop was and how many generations it had been there. The barbershop had tremendous sentimental value, but money was clouding Calvin's thoughts. Within the barbershop group, there were people who loved and truly cared about each other. All Calvin wanted was more money; he didn't take the time to think how significant the shop was not only to just him, but to others around him also. It took Calvin selling the shop to see the value of relationships and realize that money won't buy happiness and cannot fulfill the things friendships can.No matter how much money you have in your possession, you will never be able to buy yourself happiness. Yeah a nice house, a nice car and any material thing you want might be nice, but you can't accomplish true happiness with money. In the beginning of the movie, Calvin had a picture of Oprah's guest house and he was trying to start all these small businesses thinking that being able to buy a huge house was going to make him and his wife happy. One of my favorite quotes from the movie is when Eddie said to Calvin, "Yo daddy may 'notta had a whole 'lotta money, oh but he was rich, cause he invested in people." This is such a powerful quote because of the meaning it has. Eddie is saying Calvin's dad changed peoples lives by giving them jobs, cutting their hair, and just letting them be in the barbershop. After Calvin sold the barbershop, he thought about it and saw the happiness and relationships in the barbershop. His wife was so disappointed in him and so was everyone else, and he finally realized that his father's barbershop was worth more than twenty grand, what it represented couldn't be purchased for any amount of money. Friendships and relationships do last a lifetime. Eddie was one of the barbers that had held a job there for so many years. Before he worked for Calvin, he worked for Calvin's father. Eddie built numerous relationships around the barbershop along with others who were customers and employees. His best and closest friends he saw every day while at the barbershop. They had conversations about anything and everything. You could go into that barbershop and talk about whatever you wanted. There were so many memories in the barbershop; you probably couldn't even count them. Checker Fred had been there every day for who knows how many years. After Calvin realized that the barbershop was more valuable than he realized before, he was a richer man.This movie helped me realized that money isn't everything, but friendship is. Money is important to a certain extent, but not to the degree where we lose any sort of relationship.