Comedian Chris Rock combs through the culture and industry of
African-American hair, and its complicated, fraught history, with
observational humour and surprising depth. Director-collaborator Jeff
Stilson guides the affable Rock through a world of pop-can-eroding
relaxer chemicals (Rock observes it’s called relaxer because it’s
actually relaxing white people), expensive weaves and underground hair
markets, with insight from celebrities like Al Sharpton, Maya Angelou,
Ice-T and Salt-n-Pepa (Pepa’s much-copied asymmetrical style was the
result of a home relaxer accident). Good Hair should probe
harder, but it’s also refreshing to watch a balanced documentary that
doesn’t openly mock its subjects. Michael Moore and followers, take
note.
This article appears in Nov 12-18, 2009.