Beauty-bots
Now Playing: Itty bitty reviews of BEAUTY SHOP and ROBOTS
One of the more durable plots in Hollywood is the scrappy upstarts taking on the big bad corporate establishment, and both of these new films use this formula. But while this scenario has proven durable over the years, it's rarely done in an interesting manner, and neither of these films avoids falling into the trap of cliche. Of the two, ROBOTS (2005, Chris Wedge and Carlos Saldanha) comes a bit closer to being a good movie, largely because the design aspect of the movie has a certain level of interest. The robot designs hearken back to pre-Space Age inspirations, in particular the "outmodes," a group of unwieldy old robots pieced together from spare parts and junk. However, the screenplay lets the film down, and the story played for its most kid-friendly tendencies, with a few digs at corporations and modern advertising ("why be you when you can be NEW?") thrown in for good measure. Likewise, the voiceover talents mostly range from the forgettable (Ewan McGregor, Halle Berry) to the annoying (Robin Williams, please go away), with a few standouts such as Stanley Tucci's plucky dad and (my favorite of the bunch) Paul Giamatti as the chirpily sarcastic security guard Tim, who isn't around nearly long enough.

BEAUTY SHOP (2005, Billie Woodruff) sees Queen Latifah's Gina moved to Atlanta and away from her BARBERSHOP 2 pals. Fed up with the way she's treated by her mincing faux-Eurotrash boss Jorge (Kevin Bacon) she takes out a loan and starts up her own shop in a predominantly African-American neighborhood. While there are hints of racial tension sprinkled throughout the film (Gina tries to play the race card during a loan interview, new stylist Alicia Silverstone has a rough time of it when she first arrives in Gina's salon, and the like), the film would prefer to be a slightly raunchy sitcom, with conversations about booty, pubic hair, and men. There's also some business with a state inspector Jorge is bribing to inspect Gina's salon at awkward times, and Gina's daughter's preparation for a music school recital, both of which contributed to the feeling I got that there was just too much plot for this thing to work for me. The performances were nothing special either, with the Queen on autopilot again (she's never quite lived up to the promise displayed in SET IT OFF), Djimon Hounsou employed for largely aesthetic value as her electrician love-interest, and a gallery of sassy stylists including Maya Angelou-quoting Alfre Woodard, who was too over-the-top here for my taste. Genial enough, I guess, but pretty disposable.

Ratings:
ROBOTS: *1/2.
BEAUTY SHOP: *1/2.