Sometimes a hit is the worst thing for your career—just ask the vast majority of actors and actresses who had hit TV shows but were unable to find work afterward because they had become so typecast as a particular character. So it’s nice to see John Ratzenberger, who will forever be mailman Cliff Clavin from the classic sitcom Cheers, get to show his face in something new. (I say “show his face” because his voice has been an integral part of every Pixar feature animated film.) In the independent movie The Village Barbershop, he stars as Art Leroldi, a widowed barber in Reno, Nevada. After 30 years of running a two-man barbershop, his partner dies, taking all of the shop’s personality with him. With no assets and a landlord just itching to evict him, Art is forced to find a new partner who is not quite to his liking: Gloria, whose trucker boyfriend just dumped her as she was on the verge of telling him that she’s pregnant. It’s an old formula but a sturdy one, and if the plot doesn’t even attempt to do anything surprising, it still provides the two leads plenty of room to play with their characters. As Gloria, Shelly Cole (of TV’s Gilmore Girls) looks and sounds a bit like the young (pre-tattoo) Janeane Garofalo, with a tartness that balances her co-stars curmudgeonliness. Both smarter and crankier than Cliff Clavin, Art divides his spare time between placing losing bets at the racetrack and planning small revenges against anyone who crosses his path. The Village Barbershop is by no means a great movie—debuting writer-director Chris J. Ford is too lax in shaping his material—but it’s an awfully likeable one. It will be playing at the Screening Room in Williamsville this weekend, with shows on Friday at 7:15pm and 9:15pm and on Saturday and Tuesday at 7:15pm.

—m. faust