Good Hair ( *** )

October 27, 2009 9:46 a.m. EST

95 minutes

In theaters October 30, 2009

Rating: PG-13, Documentary

Who says documentaries have to be deadly serious?

Good Hair delves into the roots of its subject and manages to make its share of valid sociopolitical points even though its tone is playful and its pace is brisk. And although its tongue is sometimes in its cheek, its cards are also right there on the table.

Of course, this particular "human interest" doc has the benefit of the hyphenated involvement of comedian Chris Rock, who serves as host-narrator-writer-producer.

As Rock explains at the very top, it was his own five-year-old daughter who inspired the film when she asked him, "Daddy, why don't I have good hair?" Was she saying, he wondered, that White hair was good and Black hair bad?

To answer her -- and to explore the history and culture of African-American hair here -- Rock interviews a number of celebrated African-American women, who help to explain why some turn to straightening, despite the potentially hazardous chemicals involved, and others to extensions, braids, weaves, relaxers, or dreads.

The film's one big misstep -- although by the time it occurs, this hirsute doc has earned so much goodwill that it's only mildly bothersome -- is a sequence involving the Bronner Bros. International Hair Show in Atlanta, a competition among hairdressers that provides the film a conventional competitive climax but that takes takes for too much time, is far too campy, and sheds far too little light.

But Rock makes everything work better than it should because he's not only funny with a spontaneous quip -- we knew that about him already -- but he also happens to be, with his smart, disarming queries and empathetic, bemused reactions, a smart and effective interviewer.

Director Jeff Stilson, a writer and standup comic making his directorial debut, finds an accessible, audience-friendly way to provide social commentary and explore such themes as self-esteem, economics, beauty, and racism without resorting to any form of lecture.

Along the way, Rock calls on such notables as Maya Angelou, Eve, Al Sharpton, Nia Long, Ice-T, Raven-Symone, Kerry Washington, and Salt-N-Pepa to share their insights and observations about the topic. He also visits companies that make the many hair products women depend on.

He even travels to India, where most of the hair used in weaves sold in the U.S. come from. And, perhaps most enjoyable of all, he settles in at a barbershop to talk to men willing to discuss how their dealings with the women in their lives, some of it quite intimate, is affected by the way they feel about what sits on top of their heads.

This lighthearted documentary is affable, funny, breezy, and yet remarkably insightful. Are you ready? Good Hair's heady.