The Help (2011)

I hadn't yet read Kathryn Stockett's breakout hit novel "The Help" prior to the release of writer/director Tate Taylor's big screen adaptation, but once the buzz began to circle the film, I grabbed the book and read it quickly - in just a few sittings, actually. It was the kind of book that kept me entertained and involved at all times but never went as deep as it could.

The filmed version of "The Help," despite some talk arguing that it actually elevates the source material, accomplished the same goal in my mind. It was the kind of movie that kept me entertained and involved at all times but never went as deep as it could.

Many of my co-workers read the book at the same time and most wanted to compare and contrast it with the film. Did Stockett write black dialect the way people really talk? Is there something insensitive in a white person's verison of black dialect? (If so, then we need to deal with Huck Finn and a bunch of other stuff!) Is this just another black-people-can't-save-themselves-so-we-need-a-white-person-to-swoop-in-and-rescue-them sort of story?

Those are fair questions.

"The Help" can either be seen as being the story of a young white woman who is forward thinking enough in the racially divided South of the 1960s to not give in to the prejudices of her family and neighbors, or it can be seen as the story of a middle-aged black maid who is corageous enough in the racially divided South of the 1960s to motivate her fellow servant-friends to share their stories with an opportunity-seeking white girl.

Perhaps the problem of the story itself is that "The Help" probably wants to be the latter but is just as easily the former, and the film does not solve this problem from the novel. In the film, actress Viola Davis gives such a powerful, soulful performance as Aibileen, the black maid, and Emma Stone is so frequently awkward and too pretty as Skeeter, the white wanna-be writer, that the weight of the movie wants to shift in narrative favor toward Aibilieen. But Taylor includes so much of Stone in the film in terms of her character's personal life that we're left with essentially a 50/50 split. That, to me, was troublesome to this story.

Thank God for the x-factor, a character named Minny Jackson. In the novel, Minny is hard, angry and tough to like, though her frankness becomes comical and readers root for her in every decision and learn from her more than any other character. In the film, actress Octavia Spencer, a Hollywood bit player, has her coming-out party in what is certainly the film's most engaging and entertaining role. The film bests the novel in its use of humor to lighten the tone, and Spencer drives the funny car. "The Help" is a better movie whenever she is on screen.

I'm certain I haven't done a very comprehensive job of explaining the plot, but I feel like most people know this one by now. Skeeter is kind to "the help" while the other white women lording over their huge Mississippi plantation mansions are condescending and entitled. The women who work for them, always black, are direct descendants to slaves. They touch, comfort and care for the white babies more than their mothers. They are a precarious blend of slaves and mothers themselves.

One woman named Hilly Holbrook is particularly uppity. She commandeers the local ladies bridge club and starts a grassroots campaign among the ladies auxiliary to get a law passed requiring the help to use separate, outdoor bathrooms. "They have their own diseases," she tells the other women.

Aibileen is the dutiful maid to the Leefolt family. She's a strong, proud woman with a tragic past. It's important for her to have her job. Mrs. Leefolt appears to be fair to Aibileen, at least for as long as she can stay out from under Hilly's influence. But the word coming from the high society dining rooms, coupled with the images of segreation and political turmoil on the TV remind Aibileen that things are getting worse.

Skeeter takes a job at a Jackson newspaper writing a cleaning column. She's out of her league and relies on Aibileen for help. This soon turns into an idea for a book. Skeeter convinces Aibileen, under the protection of anonymity, to talk about what it's like to be the help. She encourages Aibileen to wrangle other women to participate in the discussion as well. Before long, Aibileen even comes to believe in what they are doing.

Reluctantly, Minny is the first to come on board, but her stories are becoming so legendary in the neighborhood that her anonymity would be more difficult to protect. And outside of this work, the recently-fired Minny has taken up a new job for a somewhat-crazy white lady on the outskirts of town named Ceelia Foote, who before long becomes the film's most sympathtic character.

The film's triumph lies in its acting. Davis is perfect for the part of Aibileen and gives a fully-formed and lived-in performance. She provides the film with its dramatic grounding and is riviting at all times, though I must admit that I'm not convinced she was more powerful here than in her 10 minutes of Oscar-nominated screen time in "Doubt." Nonetheless, she is excellent.

And, as I've mentioned before, this is Spencer's movie. I couldn't wait for her to show up on screen. Her Minny is a take-no-sass firecracker, and in one of the film's key moments, Spencer is able to milk more laughs with the drop of eyes' focus than most actors could achieve with a solid delivery of a well-written line.

I'm wondering, in retrospect, if Spencer is too good at times and shifts the tone away from the real seriousness of the social climate of the time. "The Help" is "civil rights-lite." This was the novel's problem and it does not get fixed here. Taylor's tempered blend of the comic with the dramatic keeps the film in a TV-movie-of-the-week place, never allowing it the weight it deserves.

Perhaps this is why, for me, some of the most heartbreaking moments in "The Help" come not from the overburdoned black maids but from the character of Celia and a powerful performance by Jessica Chastain. Celia is an outsider, somewhat inexplicably. In moments that resemble the deep South's "Mean Girls," she is kept out of the loop and treated condescendingly. Her life is sad, and her eventual connection with Minny is touching. This, for me, gave "The Help" more of an emotional center than the race issues of the film.

I enjoyed "The Help." I was involved in it the entire time. I laughed a lot. I wish I could say I was moved to tears, but I was not. I think I should have been. It was enjoyable. It looked great. It was a little too long. The acting was wonderful. When I add up all of these somewhat generic but true phrases, "The Help" ends up being a solid, if not amazing, movie.

3.0 out of 4