While it's not the star of the new film "Barbershop" -- that honor goes to rapper-turned-actor Ice Cube -- a Tranax Mini-Bank 2100 does play a key role in the movie, which opens in theaters nationwide today.

"(MGM) told us it was the star prop," said Scott Kleinman, Tranax Technologies' director of marketing.

The Mini-Bank 2100 is ready for its close-up, as seen in the new movie "Barbershop."

After attending a sneak preview of the film, which relates a day in the life of a group of characters that hang around a barbershop on Chicago's South Side, Tranax marketing coordinator Nichole Langenfeld said she was surprised to see the ATM in the very first scene and turning up again and again.

"Throughout the film, they keep going back to these two thieves who stole an ATM from this convenience store near the barber shop. They drag it all over the city," Langenfeld said.

A piece of animation on the film's promotional Web site even shows a figure, in profile, scurrying off with an ATM.

The film has earned almost uniformly positive reviews. Boston Globe critic Ty Burr called it "very funny" and "unexpectedly graceful." According to Lou Lumenick of the New York Post, "its humor is as inclusive as it is infectious."

"A subplot involving a stolen ATM puts a heavy drag on the film's pacing -- almost as if the audience was forced to carry the thing," Deborah Hornblow of the Hartford Courant wrote in her review. But other critics welcomed the comic relief of the ATM story line, with Anthony Anderson and Lahmand Tate as the bumbling thieves.

Showing his cinema chops, the New York Post's Lumenick pointed out in his review that the use of the ATM is based upon a Stan Laurel/Oliver Hardy short called "The Music Box."

Tranax was contacted by MGM in late 2001. Kleinman said studio executives told him the Mini-Bank 2100 had the "right look" for the movie and wanted a machine that could withstand the punishment of being dragged around the streets of Chicago during filming.

Tranax was given a copy of the script to review, with each scene that the ATM appears in highlighted for easy reference. "After we felt confident our ATM wouldn't be portrayed in a negative light, we decided it made a lot of sense," Kleinman said. "We welcome any opportunity to show off the reliability and the security of our products."

Indeed, every method the thieves use to try to break into the ATM -- including an ax attack -- is unsuccessful.

Tranax provided filmmakers with a working Mini-Bank 2100 for close-ups and an empty shell for the scenes in which the thieves manhandle the ATM. The studio returned the real deal to Tranax after filming.

Unlike more high-profile product placements featuring sodas, liquor and other products, the Tranax logo is never visible. "I'm not sure there is the same kind of potential for product placement with an ATM," Kleinman said.

However, he points out, Tranax did not have to pay to put its product in pictures.

Because of its distinctive design, Kleinman said, it will be obvious to Tranax distributors and other folks in the industry that they're seeing a Mini-Bank up on the screen.

In addition, Kleinman said, "It's something fun for our employees." A group of them planned to attend a sneak preview on Sept. 12 using passes provided by MGM after attending an office party commemorating the occasion.