When the tiny burgh of Keighley lands the rights to host the annual British hairdressing championships, practically every city in the United Kingdom is represented in the competition -- except Keighley itself. It seems the event is team-oriented, and the only suitable local contestants had a huge falling out a decade ago. For Brian (
Josh Hartnett), the son of two hairdressers, that falling out had personal consequences: His mother Shelley (
Natasha Richardson) left his father Phil (
Alan Rickman) to take up with Phil's hair model Sandra (
Rachel Griffiths). Since then, former styling champ Phil has settled for training Brian to help run his lowly barber shop, while Shelley and Sandra have opened a salon of their own. But when Shelley learns that she has terminal cancer, she reaches out to her family in hopes that a reunion for the hairdressing contest might help them all find some sense of closure. To complicate matters, Phil's old arch-nemesis, Ray (
Bill Nighy), is now a two-time champ looking for a three-peat, and he's brought along his beautiful American daughter Christina (
Rachael Leigh Cook) to work on his team. Blow Dry also marks the screen debut of supermodel
Heidi Klum. ~ Brian J. Dillard, All Movie Guide