I’m just about the last one who should ever be commenting on Bad Hair. Decades ago, I emerged nearly bald from a salon due to a miscommunication with my barber – I take small consolation that they went out of business later that year—and ever since, I have decided that a lot of Bad Hair is better than no hair. In the land where Reagan was a messiah, this has not aided my popularity. Hilarity, perhaps, but not popularity.
Speaking of the Reagan era, Bad Hair takes place in the rattail end of it, presumably when the weave was first introduced as a common way for black women to shame other black women. Luckily, thanks to the aptly titled documentary Good Hair, I no longer have to be schooled in what a weave is. As I understand it, the overwhelming majority of folks with African roots will –if left unshorn- develop Afros. However, said hairstyle ceased being popular in the African-American community about the same time that Angela Davis stopped making headlines. A weave is black hair harvested from Asia (often India or Korea), collected as if an everyday textile, and then literally woven into the existing and deliberately matted down natural hair of a black woman. The process takes hours, costs $$$$, and can be very painful depending on how skilled your stylist. Did I get that right?
Even if I didn’t, I’m cutting, snipping and clipping to the chase.
Our hair-oine is Anna (Elle Lorraine), a struggling peon in one of those third-rate music video companies that emerged in the wake of MTV’s success. Anna has serious trouble with her rent, boyfriend, family, and job, but other than that, her life seems fine. Her attempts to become a veejay have … hmmm, how shall I put this? I want to use a hair-related metaphor … Oh, I got it: you know that thing where you’re using a curling iron and you forget that you left it in your hair and it burns your scalp so badly that you have to be hospitalized? That. Anna seems to think that her natural hair is her biggest challenge to the problem. Personally, I think her look (not necessarily her hair) is wrong for veejay-ness, but that’s just me.
One day, head dude Grant (James Van Der Beek, remember him?) shows up and dudes heads start to roll. It looks like Anna’s head is next on the chopping block when she stays a last second execution with an already bound-and-documented plan to save the station that Anna just happens to carry around with her 24/7, I guess. Part of this plan involves Anna taking either a production or host role in the station’s new marquee program. Boss Vanessa Williams (remember her?) says, essentially, Anna will have to do something about her ‘fro the part; boss gives Anna a card for the evil hair salon downtown.
Now, you would think a hair salon that sells carnivorous, lethal hair would at least sell it at a discount, but noooooooooo. What’s up with that? Long story short, 
Anna now has evil hair. Fantastic-looking evil hair, but evil hair nonetheless. And the hair has a mind of its own. And I think it took too long to get to this part, but now that we’re here, the film is mildly funny and mildly scary, perhaps best exemplified by when the hair by itself eschews the need for Anna to use tampons. Yes, that happened, and yes, it was pretty damn funny.
Bad Hair is one of those films I kinda feel sorry for. You know writer/director Justin Simien made it from whatever he was able to scrounge together between couch cushions. I love that 1980s icons Vanessa Williams and Blair Underwood are in this picture and yet, of course, I had no idea they and James Van Der Beek could be had so cheap; after watching them act anew … oh, yes, I can see why. And yet, yet, yet, this film is still better than at least half of the horror films I see, including 90% of the found-footage genre. I can’t recommend this film, but –comparatively-it’s not a terrible horror; I’d like to see what Justin Simien could do with a real budget.
There once was a woman named Anna
Who had ambitions of a hungry piranha
But when her hair followed suit
Her career became moot
And she was better off in a bandana
Unrated, 102 Minutes
Director: Justin Simien
Writer: Justin Simien
Genre: Oh, what a tangled web we weave
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: The 1980s
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: The 1960s
