The Help 2 views of a controversial film

The Help views- the film adaptation of Kathryn Stockett’s novel “The Help” recently opened nationwide, and Montgomerians can be proud that one of their own — the accomplished actress Octavia Spencer — plays a key role.

It’s 1963 in Jackson, Miss., and Aibileen and Minny, two black maids, join Skeeter, a young, white aspiring writer fresh out of Ole Miss, to tell the long-repressed stories of domestics who have cleaned house, cooked and raised the children of rich white women in that old Southern town.

Spencer, a prolific film and TV actress, plays Minny, an outspoken domestic who is raising a brood of her own kids, warding off an abusive husband and shouldering the demands of her employers, along with their often humiliating words and actions.

The critically acclaimed novel on which the movie is based has been astoundingly successful since its 2009 publication. It reached the No. 1 position on the New York Times bestsellers list, where it has been included for about

two dozen consecutive weeks. On Amazon.com, the book took the No. 1 and No. 2 spots in historical fiction and literary fiction, respectively.

Viola Davis as the determined housekeeper Aibileen in the cinematic version of Stockett's novel, I am persuaded, that, yes, Skeeter, a recent college graduate raised by her family's maid, has a claim to the story, too. Initially, I was angered by this young white woman's seeming appropriation of the maids' stories. But no more.

And, in the movie, the sound of the South rolls from the mouths of both white and black women, taking away another of my objections to the book. (It grated for me to read the black housekeepers speaking in a way-down-South patois, with no drawl or dialect from the white women.)

By telling the film version of Stockett's story of four black maids and the hateful white, Mississippi women for whom they work, Dreamworks Studios and director Tate Taylor highlight the slow change that bore some fruit in the U.S. in the early '60s - even in Mississippi. The civil rights struggle is a backdrop to this story.

KNOWING THEM

My personal experience parallels it in many ways, and I grew up in North Carolina knowing intimately the Aibileens, Constantines and Minnys that people it. They were my aunts and my neighbors and the women with whom I attended church. I watched each morning as they waited for the bus that would take them far away from their own homes. They were the ones who worked hard during the week and beyond, shook their heads at how "nasty" their particular white people could be, and prayed - yes, Lord - on Sunday for a way out and a way up.

And, yes, some of those women came to love some of the white charges they were pitifully paid to care for. To suggest otherwise, as have some black women with whom I have spoken, would deny the essential humanity of black women whose capacity to love is assuredly intact. Some of the film's most poignant scenes are those in which Aibileen works to instill a sense of worth in Mae Mobley, a white toddler whose mother ignores her.

Aibileen knew that she was somebody and that her job did not define her and was working to pass along that knowledge. This is made-for-TV, pull-out-the-lace-hankie stuff, for sure, but it is also real.

Happily, the serious trumps the sappy. A fine cast makes "The Help" a message-bearing vehicle that only occasionally veers toward the maudlin.

The film is a story of conflict, but more important, of courage. Especially of the sort that shows what can happen when just one person steps away from the crowd. Aibileen was such a person, as was the gutsy, outspoken Minny, played by Octavia Spencer. And surely, it took a special kind of valor to pull Skeeter away from her high-society cohorts to even suggest the writing project on which the movie and the book turn.

The Help Movie Review

"The Help" and the book that preceded it details relationships between white women and African-American domestic helpers, or maids, in America in the 1960s. For the maids in the story, and in turn, actress Octavia Spencer, the interactions weren't always pleasant.
"For me, being in this type of oppressive environment, that was definitely suffocating, and I definitely had a little bit of a chip on my shoulder," Spencer says.
To remedy this feeling, Spencer said she and Ahna O'Reilly, who plays white woman Elizabeth Leefolt in the film, shared a house together while filming in Mississippi for 12 weeks.
"I felt like it was important for me not to go so far field where I lost myself and my sanity," she says "That was a time that preceded us and, again, I think while the film takes place during that time, it reallydoes celebrate the relationship that these people were able to construct in spite of the bigotry and the social morays. But for me, I was definitely grumpy a lot, because it was just a lot of emotional baggage to bring along when you're creating characters who are in an oppressive environment.
"Ahna and I lived together,and we all basically had dinner together every other night, and for those of who weren't working, we would spend an inordinate amount of time going to have free lunch on the set. There was never that type of animosity; I think the reality of the situation was that we knew we were playing roles. There was mutual admiration, love and respect on that set."
Spencer and Kathryn Stockett, the author of the novel "The Help," formed a friendship a few years ago while Stockett was in the process of writing the book. Inspired by Spencer's demeanor and personality, Stockett based one of the central characters, Minny Jackson, loosely on Spencer.
When director/writer/actor Tate Taylor, a mutual friend of both ladies, began working adapting the book for the big screen, Spencer seemed the perfect fit to portray the character. Spencer didn't hesitate to jump on board.
"What resonated with me with this project is that I think this is a story that we've seen so many times before, but never from the perspective of the domestics," she says. "It's one of the few times that African-American women are definitely portrayed in this era and still have depth and relevance and intelligence, and you see their lives outside of what they do in their employment.


DreamWorks Pictures made a wise decision in hiring Taylor to write and direct the film. Taylor was able to effectively capture Stockett’s important theme that Skeeter stood for her beliefs; she didn’t give in to Hilly, Elizabeth and even her mother Charlotte’s (portrayed by Allison Janney) insistence that their maids weren’t worthy of the same rights they received. ‘The Help’ also proves that people don’t have to come from the same background to stand up for what’s right. Skeeter was perfectly happy to give up her place in white society, if it meant she could expose the injustices the African-American community was experiencing.


Stone, who has become known for her comedic roles in such films as ‘Easy A,’ ‘Zombieland’ and ‘Crazy, Stupid, Love,’ gave a memorable performance as Skeeter in ‘The Help.’ She proved her versatility as an actress in the film’s dramatic scenes, showing she was truly sympathetic to the maids’ struggle for equality. Stone didn’t just use the material Taylor provided for her in the script; she drew on her own willpower to prove Skeeter wanted to stand up for what’s right.


‘The Help’ is also memorable in the fact that all of the characters were surprisingly well-developed, even though it featured a large ensemble cast. While the audience is connecting to Skeeter while she persistently pursues her dreams of becoming a writer, they’ll likely also be applauding her determinedness to tell the maids’ stories and see to them obtaining equal rights. Aibileen and Minny are also unique, distinctive characters in their own rights, and perfectly complement Skeeter’s strong, take-charge attitude.


Serious Aibileen, who has cared for 17 children during her life, shows her courage by being the first maid to tell Skeeter her life story. She doesn’t care about the repercussions she may face, if it means improving the lives of all African-American maids. The outspoken Minny readily speaks the truth, and doesn’t think or care about the consequences she or anyone else may face. She wants a better life for her and her children, and doesn’t care who she insults, if it means getting what she wants.


While many film adaptations of books aren’t as emotionally touching, and don’t feature as many in-depth characters and themes, as their source material, Taylor definitely stayed true to Stockett’s novel. Combining the important theme that people’s equality is more important than other people’s opinions with memorable characters, ‘The Help’ will certainly support Taylor and Stone’s thriving careers.