Barbershops On The Big Screen

The Good, The Bad and The Funny

We would like to salute a sub-sub-sub-movie genre thats more appropriate for us great Barbershop Movies. To be fair, there arent many movies that completely revolve around the Barbershopexcept, of course, Barbershopbut a lot of memorable scenes with some of the greatest stars of all time happened around a haircut. In any case, heres a look at some great cinema in which barbers played parts both big and small.

Lets start with Johnny Depp in Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007), or, as we like to call it, When Haircuts Go VERY Wrong. The story of Sweeney Todd first circulated in the 1850s and, to be honest, the bloody saga of a barber killing his customers and turning them into a cheap lunch isnt very good publicity for a barber club franchise such as ours. However, we can take some comfort in the fact that the character is completely fictional and you can rest assured that no Kennedys would ever employ a barber who used his own tricked-out chair to slit our patrons throats. Talk about biting the hand that feeds younot good for business!

The Barbershop also had a memorable and bloody cameo in one of the great films of all time, The Godfather (1972and one of our 100 favorite guy films as well, naturally). Thats where Vegas chief Moe Green (played by Alex Rocco) got a bullet right through his glasses during the epic films climax. That was a real eye-opener.

Who remembers John Waynes last movie, The Shootist (1976)? If you do, the scene you probably think of is the Dukes final shoot-out in the huge, elaborate saloon. Earlier in the film, however, Wayne, playing a famous gunfighter close to death, heads for a haircut at the town Barbershop. There, the town undertaker comes in and offers to take care of his funeral for free. Wayne, knowing the guy is preparing to sell tickets to see his body, instead turns the offer around to where the undertaker pays him for his funeral. The chastened undertaker slinks out of the Barbershop.

A minute later, as Wayne is leaving, he turns to the barber and tells him he probably could make a profit selling his hair clippings, too. The barber laughs, but after Waynes out the door, he thinks a moment and starts picking up the cuttings to make a fast buck later.

The Barbershop, fortunately, has also had a lot of lighter moments on the silver screen thanks to some classic comedians. If youre a Marx Brothers fan, you can enjoy Harpo and Chico torpedoing a ship officers hair and moustache in a cruise ship Barbershop in Monkey Business (1931), Charlie Chaplin portraying a barber who gets mistaken for Hitler (never a good thing!) in The Great Dictator (1940), and the ever-reliable Bugs Bunny doing his own cartoon Sweeney Todd on Elmer Fudd in the brilliant Rabbit of Seville (1940). A snippet of memorable lyric from that animated opera:

Bugs: Now we're ready for the scraping There's no use to try escaping Yell and scream and rant and rave It's no use, you need a shave!

Elmer: (as Bugs slashes with razor] Ooh! Ouch! Ouch! Ow! Ooh! Ooh! Ouch!

No, its not Stephen Sondheim especially Elmers part but it does get its point across.

Copyright (c) 2009 Kennedy's All-American Club

About the Author:
Kennedy's All-American Barber Club' caters to gentlemen looking for a fine grooming experience with the old world charm of your father's barber shop. Offering the finest in haircuts for men, the lost art of straight-razor shaves and a modern selection of grooming products Learn more about Kennedy's by visiting http://www.KennedysBarberClub.com

Barbershops On The Big Screen

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