Another in a long line of Full Monty-inspired tales (Billy Elliot being the most successful) about spunky, working-class Northern Brits pulling together to better their lives, Blow Dry should have had an advantage over the others since it was written by Full Monty scribe Simon Beaufoy. Well, not "written" exactly... The film's credits, while not listing any other writers, say, "Based on the screenplay "Never Better" by Simon Beaufoy." This odd construction is the first hint as to the film's problems - Blow Dry feels like a by-the-numbers, cut-and-paste comedy-drama where no opportunity has been missed to manipulate the audience or throw yet another disingenuously "quirky" situation into the mix.

The not-so-picturesque Yorkshire town of Keighley is the site for the 2000 British Hairdressing Championship, something that young barber Brian (American heartthrob Josh Hartnett) is pretty excited about. Unfortunately, his dad, Phil (Alan Rickman), a former star on the hairdressing circuit, wants nothing to do with it. Phil has been a bitter, semi-alcoholic barber content to "waste" his talent on the locals ever since his wife - Brian's mom - Shelly (Natasha Richardson) ran off with Phil's model Sandra (Rachel Griffiths) on the eve of the championship ten years before. Hairdressers as well, Shelly and Sandra are treated as pariahs by Phil, but Shelly sees this championship as a chance to make amends, something she feels compelled to do because she has terminal cancer...

That synopsis encompasses the first 20 or so minutes of the film and it's not hard to see where the movie goes from there. Whenever a film feels compelled to use a seemingly in-the-pink lead character's impending death as the main plot device, warning flags tend to go up, and true to that cliché, Blow Dry doesn't miss a chance to pull at the heartstrings. Unfortunately, the film's attempts at manipulation are so heavy-handed that they are likely to leave audiences unmoved and perhaps even irritated. To wit: when Shelly finally pulls off her wig to reveal the chemo-ravaged wisps of hair on her head to husband and son, it is supposed to be a grave dramatic moment. Aside from being crass-Shelly uses her imminent death as a form of emotional blackmail to convince Phil and Brian to... join a HAIRDRESSING TEAM?-the move is so calculated that one could be forgiven for thinking that Shelly's true "sin" is not having abandoned her family, or being a lesbian, or even dying of cancer, but having really bad hair...

Having said that, the film is not without its pleasures, most of which derive from the casting. For the most part Natasha Richardson - who, unfortunately, hasn't had a really big part in a major film since The Handmaid's Tale in 1990 - manages to transcend the clichés of her role, giving Shelly dignity and vivacity, and commanding our attention whenever she's on screen. Alan Rickman is, as usual, eminently watchable as the lugubrious Phil, while the pinched-faced and absurdly coiffed Bill Nighy (the decadent lead singer from the 70s-rock-band-reunion-comedy Still Crazy) as the cheating, reigning champ Ray - a Londoner, naturally -makes an apt villain. Performances aside, however, Blow Dry's limp script makes you wish Beaufoy had given it a serious conditioning or even a complete dye job prior to letting it out of the salon chair.