Good Hair

 In a list of things that I don’t know much about or understand, hair ranks in third, right behind atom hybridization and women. I could lead a seminar on hidden meanings in Harry Potter (the number seven! Halloween! Socks!), but things like curling just send me through a loop.

That’s where Good Hair comes in. Chris Rock’s new documentary examines the importance of women’s hair in the black community. Rock believes hair has the power to mold personal identity and also pressures black women to painstakingly adopt “white” hairstyles. In his pursuit of the social, medical and economic aspects of the black hair industry, Rock interviews celebrities from Ice-T to Maya Angelou and travels from Harlem to India, all in hopes of answering why black women shed thousands of dollars for updos.

Although Rock certainly provides plenty of laughs along the way, his general level of seriousness shocks viewers into realizing the strangeness of the situation. Hearing from a black teenager scared to wear an afro in the workplace and seeing a four year-old use dangerous chemicals to get the “pretty” hair of white women succeeds in raising provocative questions about race, identity and wealth. Unfortunately, the documentary does not provide any solution to the dilemma it describes. Rock talks about how black women need to embrace their black identity, but never says how. He merely concludes that hair expresses African-American creativity and that black women will be beautiful with or without straight, silky hair.

Whether you are black or white, male or female, have hair like T-Pain or Al Sharpton, Good Hair is a movie you should watch. Its stunningly frank interviews, hilarious narrator and interesting topic make it worth its weight in weaves.