Weave of Destruction
Bad Hair is a love letter written with a poison pen.
sometimes, a terrible movie reminds me to cherish the films that accomplish what they set out to do—or, at least, the ones that seem to be having fun in the process of attempting to. But Bad Hair was such an excruciating cinematic experience that I started to wonder if this whole motionpicture business maybe wasn’t a good idea from the jump. I have reviewed my share of cinematic failures this year, but Bad Hair is the most stunning floundering of filmmaking in 2020—a failure of empathy, intellect, and morality that
I haven’t been able to shake.
BAD HAIR DIRECTED BY JUSTIN SIMIEN. HULU.
Writer, director, and producer Justin Simien made a bold proclamation in a pretaped segment that aired before Hulu’s drive-in Bad Hair premiere in October. “Bad Hair is a very weird love letter to Black women and the unparalleled power they possess to endure and persevere. It’s my satirical horror love letter. Is that a thing? I guess we’re making it a thing.” After seeing the film, I’d say no. Regardless, the statement is instructive, foreshadowing the film’s intent: Can a campy horror film about Black women’s relationship to their hair translate onto the screen? Perhaps, but it would require a nimble filmmaker with a strong vision to pull it off.
Maybe a striking stylist could wring both fright and delight from the story of Anna (Elle Lorraine), a desperate and anxious assistant at a television channel in 1989 who clumsily tries to climb the ranks at her job by getting a weave that turns out to be a bloodthirsty killer hell-bent on wrecking her life, leading her to turn to the folktales of the enslaved for guidance. (I’m already winded after recounting that.) The television station is in a moment of upheaval, what with Anna’s direct boss, Edna (Judith Scott), being replaced by a former supermodel, Zora (Vanessa Williams), as the white higher-ups—primarily represented by James Van Der Beek’s Grant Madison— aim to rework things from the top down. After getting her weave done at Virgie’s (Laverne Cox) salon, life seems to be changing for Anna, as her former paramour, on-air personality Julius (Jay Pharoah), looks her way again and she finds herself up for associateproducer, an on-airtalent position she has long dreamed of. Things go sideways, though, resulting in multiple murders preceded by little tension or suspense—including an attempted rape scene that I’d describe, generously, as mishandled and unnecessary. Maybe if the actors had more verve, the direction more vision, and the script something novel to say, this sort of premise could have worked. But as it stands, Bad Hair is a botched job of monumental proportions.
Maybe in another era I could have weathered the missteps of Bad Hair without so much anger. But, frankly, I’m tired of the terrible Black horror films and shows of late, from Antebellum to Lovecraft Country. And I’m tired of the ways Black women are invoked in real life— Black women like Breonna Taylor, who was killed at the hands of police only to be used as a cudgel to influence people to vote in a system that refuses to recognize her humanity. Bad Hair isn’t the source of my exhaustion, but it perpetuates it. Simien, from my vantage point, reflects the strange, thorny relationship that Black men have to the beauty rituals of Black women and the intimate spaces in which they take place. Both the script and the direction pathologize the relationship Black women have to their hair, falling on lame tropes that frame wanting to get a relaxer or weave as a sign of Black women striving for white acceptance and power (although the villains shown throughout the film are primarily Black women, which in itself is telling).
If Bad Hair is a love letter as Simien says, it’s written with a poison pen. The script seems more keen to produce a string of breakout moments for a Twittersavvy audience than a cohesive narrative with engaging style. Simien’s direction feels deadened, as if it were fueled by an algorithm purporting to serve a youngish Black audience but that, in reality, is geared toward the understanding of white folks. Early in the film, when Anna is being interviewed by her new boss, the scene is interrupted by one of the most baffling cinematic choices I’ve witnessed this year. As the women speak, the camera slowly turns on its axis a full 360 degrees, ignoring the characters to take in … well, not much at all beyond a bit of chaos: people passing by the frosted glass, the disorganization of the office. This shot is just one in a series of bewildering visual decisions—from the eyesore of CGI hair to the gutless kills— that create distance between the audience and the characters. In this way, Bad Hair becomes more of a curiosity than a reflection of the Black people onscreen or off.
It isn’t surprising, then, that the acting in Bad Hair is so poor. Somehow, Vanessa Williams, who proved she can play a bitchy, dynamic character on the show Ugly Betty, comes across as stiff. Lena Waithe grates. Elle Lorraine injects an anxious, flighty aspect into Anna that she can’t shake once the character veers toward the vengeful, becoming a black hole where charisma goes to die.
The term campy is thrown around far too often to describe works that don’t wholly meet their aims. But Bad Hair lacks the sense of play or archness necessary to operate with the wondrous possibility of camp. It is achingly sincere—its approach to the relationship Black women have with their hair comes as nothing more than a regurgitation of trauma confused for depth. There’s something inherently troubling about tying Black women’s experiences with hair to violence, as the film’s opening scene concerning a poorly applied relaxer does. It all comes off like an opportunity for white folks to gawk at Black women under the veneer of learning and entertainment. So who is this film really for? It may posture as if it’s for Black women and Black audiences, but it’s too patronizing for that. You can find misogynoir everywhere from the boardroom to the bedroom; it powers more of this country than many would like to believe, so it’s a worthwhile subject to explore. But I question narrative Hollywood filmmaking’s ability to reflect and interrogate the Black lifeworld. Bad Hair is a banal, sepulchral tour through the failures of the Black male imagination supported by an industry that bleeds Black folks for inspiration but doesn’t care for their very humanity. ■