1) This ONE movie is trying to take on gentrification, workplace microaggressions, white corporate structure relying on Black talent, New Jack Swing, sexism, witches, colonialism, native folklore, and hair. If “biting off more than you can chew” was a moviemaker it’s Justin Simien.
2) The best hairstyle in the movie is Edna’s sisterlocks and I needed somebody to point that out.
3) Actually, for a movie called Bad Hair there isn’t a whole lot of talk about what makes hair bad or good. If a white person was watching this movie, and let’s be honest, Justin Simien definitely makes his projects with a white audience in mind, their only understanding of hair dynamics is “get a weave to get a promotion.” Spike Lee’s “Straight and Nappy” from School Daze does in less than ten minutes what Justin should have done in two hours.
4) Blair Underwood has been fine forever.
5) The lead actress, Elle Lorraine, is an obvious talent and I’m looking forward to seeing what she does next. I don’t think it should be horror, because the last act of the movie was squarely outside of her wheelhouse, but I’ll watch her in any family drama or quirky rom-com.
6) Vanessa Williams’s Wilhelmina Slater is one of the all time great Office Villains. Bad Hair needed way more of that and way less of whatever they told Vanessa to do here.
7) Is Virgie getting some kind of kickback from the evil hair harvesters for using their weaves? She has to know what she’s sewing in those folks’ heads but she didn’t make it — she’s getting that hair from a white man (which is the most unreasonable plot point in the whole move because I don’t know any Black salon getting their weaves sourced by a straight white man with a farm.)
8) As a monster movie, it’s not scary enough. As a satire, it’s not smart enough to fully capitalize on the story it’s set up. As a comedy, it’s not funny enough, and it takes itself way too seriously to be camp, so I’m not sure Bad Hair actually succeeds anywhere other than the soundtrack.
9) Kelly Rowland as a knock-off Janet Jackson is the gift I didn’t know I needed!! “I Get It” is going on both my 2020 hits playlist AND my New Jack Swing playlist. Since Montell Jordan’s “This Is How We Do It” in 1995, only one other person has managed to capture the sound of New Jack Swing, and that was Bruno Mars with “Finesse.” And now Kelly Rowland with “I Get It.”
10) There’s a good story here about how hair has been used to oppress Black women and the lengths some have gone through to achieve a certain look. Justin isn’t the person to tell that story though and I’m not sure if the movie ultimately makes a mockery of the struggle or if it’s just a mediocre monster movie.
Score: 5/10
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