The Help (Tate Taylor, 2011): USA

Reviewed by Kathleen Amboy.  Viewed at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival.

  “You is kind, you is smart, you is important,” are the words that Aibileen Clark (Viola Davis) lovingly projects to the neglected white baby girl she cares for, in addition to cooking and cleaning, as The Help for her uppity white boss, Elizabeth Leefolt (Ahna O’Reilly).

Returning home after college, Skeeter Phelan (Emma Stone), who was devotedly raised by her mother’s black housekeeper Constantine (Cicely Tyson), cannot get a straight answer as to where Constantine has disappeared to.  She yearns to be a serious writer, and takes a job with the local paper writing a Dear Abbey type column, while enlisting help and advice from Aibileen.  Skeeter is one of a group of many, young white suburbanites who gather regularly for cards and other social events.  She manages to convince a New York publisher Elain Stein (Mary Steenburgen), to back her unwritten book about the unjust treatment of black domestic help in the South.

Minny Jackson (Octavia Spencer) works for Hilly Holbrook (Bryce Dallas Howard), the most profoundly bigoted socialite of the group.  She has a will of iron, and is friends with Aibilene, and after she’s terminated from Hilly’s home for using the wrong toilet in an emergency, she agrees to help Skeeter with the covert manuscript, by confessing to a really outrageous occurrence at Hilly’s house.

Hilly nags at Skeeter to promote her phony charitable fundraiser in the newspaper, while pushing her segregated toilet manifesto, so in sheer frustration Skeeter places an ad which reads “drop old commodes [coats] at my house,” whereby Hilly discovers her front yard covered in old toilets, to the hilarity of her neighbors.

The Help uses a dark period of time in American history to reveal the absurdity of thought and behavior by many in the South at that time.  Using humor and poignancy, we are reminded to do right, if but for our own self-respect. 

Backed by a terrific cast, Viola Davis is remarkable as the long-suffering, hard-working but under-paid housekeeper.  Davis’ portrayal is positively Oscar worthy, and although Meryl Streep and Michelle Williams are close contenders for their equally strong performances, Davis has the added benefit of a strong, well produced, keenly directed, memorable film.

The moral of the film is, treat everyone kindly – especially if they cook for you!  From the mouth of Aibilene’s little white charge “I is kind, I is smart, I is important.”

 

 

 

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Published:
01.29.12 / 4pm
Category:
DVD, Films, Santa Barbara Film Festival 2012