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Give a hand to "The Help"
Thursday, March 12, 2015
It's not an easy tale to tell or a comfortable era to depict, but "The Help" confronts the issue of racism at the dawn of America's Civil Rights Movement by presenting compelling characters and intriguing situations that force viewers to ponder on race relations 50 years ago and the progress we've made. Our CineVerse group offered the following observations on this film:
WHAT DID YOU FIND SURPRISINGLY DIFFERENT ABOUT “THE HELP”
THAT DEFIED YOUR EXPECTATIONS?
- Although it’s somber and depressing at times, it’s arguably funnier and, at points, more lighthearted than one might anticipate for a film that addresses themes of racism, oppression and the Jim Crow South era.
- It’s overwhelmingly a film focused on women, with few key male characters.
- You can make a case that the white females are given more screen time than the black female characters, for better or worse.
- This is an impressively cast movie that spotlights several key actresses and Hollywood talent.
- It concludes on a somewhat sad note, with Abileen getting accused of stealing and fired.
- We need to learn from history and avoid repeating its mistakes. The film could be begging the question: Why do little white girls raised by caring black nannies grow up into bigoted adults?
- One person can make a difference and help reverse the damage and passed-down traditions of racism: consider that Skeeter bucks the trend and tries to gather the stories of the African American maids and nannies in her hometown.
- According to New York Times reviewer Manohla Dargis, “the white characters, with their troubled relationships and unloved children, carry burdens equal to those of the black characters. Like the novel, the movie is about ironing out differences and letting go of the past and anger. It’s also about a vision of a divided America that while consistently insulting and sometimes even terrifying, is rarely grotesque, despite Hilly’s best (worst) segregationist efforts.”
- Perhaps the movie emphasizes the white female characters and their challenges more than the black female characters and their trials and tribulations, which can have the effect of either diminishing the struggles of the latter or overvaluing the experiences of the former. Ask yourself: do you wish the film would have concentrated more on the two main black female characters to more effectively tell this story, or was it necessary to show more of the experience, attitudes and behaviors of the white female characters?
- The blogger Cease and DaSista wrote an interesting piece that posited the following: “Offering forgiveness is not generally bad advice on its own, but what’s done in ‘The Help’, however, suggests that black people are morally obligated to love, accept, and in essence, cherish white people.” She later writes: “It gives the audience the message, ‘See? Things weren’t really that bad. There were just a few bad seeds who made it rough for blacks, but it’s really because they were hurting inside, not because they were racist. White people really did care about black people, and black folks loved taking care of those white babies.” The blogger further offered: “The Help attempts to dismantle some of these idealized tropes that run rampant in popular culture by showing what was actually lost and who gained from sustaining the image of Scarlett O’Hara and her Tara. What detracts from that noble goal are covert ways the movie eclipses historical white racism through the absence of white men, the blind innocence of white women, and the religious obligation of Black people to heal white people’s wounds and forgive.”
- You could also argue that, by omitting any major white male characters, the movie does a disservice to history in that it downplays the undeniable presence of white male power at that time, especially in the South.
- The Long Walk Home
- Driving Miss Daisy
- Steel Magnolias
- The Color Purple
- Imitation of Life
- Gone With the Wind
- Fried Green Tomatoes
- Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood
- The Butler
