the help book criticism article

I just can’t bring myself to pay $12.50 after taxes and fees to sit in an aggressively air-conditioned, possibly bed bug-infested New York City movie theater to watch these sisters lend gravitas to Stockett’s white heroine mythology. Spencer committed to the role but in the end Minnie is an "sass-mouthin'" Mammy who "lah to fry chicken" and makes farcical facial expressions because you know Black folks of that era were all "slow of speech and slow of tongue." Nelson George smartly recommends that people unfamiliar with Civil Rights struggle see Henry Hampton’s groundbreaking “Eyes on the Prize” documentary instead. ©2020 Verizon Media. Lynching. Freedom cannot bear compromise. She ethers the novel and film so throughly that I almost feel sorry for Hollywood’s historical fantasy merchants. Similar criticisms have been applied to The Help. Minnie baked a special pie for her former white employer who fired her because she had used the house bathroom while a hurricane tore through Jackson, killing at least 10 people. ", The movie uses the same language to convey the real dangers that blacks faced in the segregated South and for trivial spats between the characters, conflating the situations which are incomparable. So I’m passing on “The Help.” And I’m feeling vindicated by several very smart reviews. There has been much praise for Octavia Spencer's Minnie. Still, this movie aspires to make you feel good. Do tell in the comments! Part of HuffPost Entertainment. Segregation. The truth is another thing that will not bear fragmentation. ", The movie goes out of its way to give us the white trash character of Celia who been ostracized by the whole society of polite white women who hold bridge parties. (There was concern that Blacks might get violent, riots might erupt). 1. I applaud you. Yet, this movie took on segregation as if it were a sidebar. If you deal in truth, then you must give the whole truth. Along with “Eyes on the Prize,” I strongly recommend people read Isabel Wilkerson’s epic great migration narrative, “The Warmth of Other Suns.” It’s nuanced, historically accurate, *and* ridiculously engaging. But Minnie and Celia form a fairy tale relationship for Celia holds financial power over Minnie. The audience laughs. People will say "But I have nothing against black people!" A larger problem for anyone interested in the true social drama of the era is that the film’s candy-coated cinematography and anachronistic super-skinny Southern belles are part of a strategy that buffers viewers from the era’s violence. The only positive thing about this movie is that it put several good Black actors on a screen before a wide audience. Given that J. Edgar Hoover did everything short of shoot Martin Luther King Jr. himself in order to damage or discredit the movement, that goes from troubling to appalling. It is never acceptable to make light of the Holocaust. She takes the fact that they are breaking the law at face value. When she hires Minnie as her maid, she responds to her as if to a mother. Her husband had to know Minnie had been hired for if he found her on his property, he might "shoot me." They wanted to show the truth of it but not too much, so as not to make anyone uncomfortable. It is too tight a context to allow us to think of our current maids, gardeners, and nannies. You are either wholly Free or not at all. Still, this movie aspires to make you feel good. Did you love, hate, or just avoid this film? The architects, visionaries, prime movers, and most of the on-the-ground laborers of the civil rights movement were African-American. Aibileen (Viola Davis) gets off the bus "and then this sturdy, frightened woman starts running as if her life were in danger, because it's Mississippi, and it is.". This isn’t the first time the civil rights movement has been framed this way fictionally, especially on film. She's a college-educated woman who is actively pursuing a writing career. Even more troubling, though, is how the structure of narratives like The Help underscores the failure of pop culture to acknowledge a central truth: Within the civil rights movement, white people were the help. She is right in that the movie is about a contemporary issue -- abuse of domestic workers. Ms. Stockett, a white woman who toiled for five years on “The Help,” uses the voices of three women (Skeeter, an emerging white liberal writer, and Minny and Aibileen, two black maids she persuades to tell their stories) to telescope a wide range of emotions and experiences in the Jim Crow Mississippi of 1962. When has a Black Person ever _____ (Insert here your greatest dream)? The performances are great! Later Celia's husband does find Minnie on the property. "Combating our privilege is something we have to learn to do, sometimes daily -- and the fact that Skeeter does it in a world where her higher status is assumed as the natural order of things is pure fairy tale. Medgar Evers assassinated. Medgar Evers assassinated. I’m sorry, but the trailer alone features way too many group hugs to be trusted. Freedom cannot bear compromise. Octavia Spencer (Minnie) has said "I think this movie transcends the time period that it's portraying. Tell us in the comments! If director Tate Taylor wanted to make a film about the plight of domestic workers, he might have made one about a Hispanic or Haitian nanny in Brooklyn. The rumor goes she got married after she had been knocked up by someone's else beau. You are either wholly Free or not at all. Despite the hype and the ensemble of fine black actresses, I’m opting out of “The Help.” The trailer alone features too many group hugs to be trusted as an accounting of the civil rights movement. Some of the same problems that separated us then separate us now. We are in Jackson, Mississippi in 1963. Segregation. If Skeeter is Ms. Stockett’s stand-in, then she makes a bold stretch by using local dialect to voice the experiences of the black women, creating a false sense of authenticity that’s vital to the novel. "Women like me will see "The Help" and think we're like Skeeter because we have some black Facebook friends," Kirby admits. Every black person knows that equality of opportunity is a hard-earned victory against real adversities like unequal access to education and fantastical adversities -- those battles we have to fight against the shadow of ourselves. But, damn it, I’m jaded, and it has absolutely nothing to do with watching Black women portray domestic workers onscreen. ", That question persists in some minds because we have yet to achieve de facto equality, when there is a truly representative political class, a truly representative merchant class, a truly representative prison population.1. In other words, they were helping themselves. The graceful Viola Davis plays Aibileen convincingly. My favorite (not!) Are we so over racism that we can now laugh at it? And it failed. This movie's tone makes it clear that it is talking about 1960s Jackson, Mississippi. FBI agents! Her ambition to produce "serious writing" about something "that makes her uncomfortable" overrides her fear. Most Hollywood civil rights movies feature white characters in central, sometimes nearly solo, roles. I even gave Tyler Perry’s “For Colored Girls” a try, only to be betrayed by that hamfisted, gay-vilifying storyline about the DL black husband who (of course) gives his wife AIDS. So they marched and they sang and they endured. This line is said in exaggeration and played for laughs. Right! They treated Minnie's defiance of white people as if it were just bad girl naughtiness. Sixty percent of these people say they receive less than minimum wage, which means about 60 percent of employers are willfully violating the Law. I did the same for “Precious” and fell out with several people who insisted that I ignore its rampant colorism, lack of systemic critique and the director’s obvious hatred for fat brown female bodies. Until then the shit in the pie is just a distraction. The Help tells the story of a plucky young writer, Eugenia "Skeeter" Phelan, who has decided to write a book about black maids who raise white children in her hometown. That scene would not be acceptable. Lynching. The renowned thespian herself urged the Hollywood powers that be to "give her [Davis] a movie" during the 2009 SAG Awards. There’s no shame in domestic work, unless you’re talking about their employers’ abuse and wage exploitation. Yet the fact remains that "79 percent or more of black and Hispanic children in public schools cannot read or do math at grade level in the fourth, eighth or 12th grades. They could never be equal or anything like mother and daughter because Celia prances around in a halter top while Minnie sweats over her paw-paws in a uniform, complete with white stockings. Jim Crow. The maids who tell Skeeter their stories speak of the risks they are taking, but the sense of physical danger that hovered over the civil rights movement is mostly absent. Jim Crow. Today is National Voter Registration Day! Writer/TV News Producer in Washington D.C. affecting an awkward walk that bespeaks her character's socially maladroit behaviors. There are things that you must have whole or not at all.If the Civil Rights activists had compromised and said we are no longer slaves, that's Freedom enough, where would we be? This character behaves like a child, talks like a child and dresses in ice-cream flavor colors. I won’t rehash those arguments, except to say that I found the novel fast-paced but highly problematic. Maybe this movie will be a vehicle to higher ground for some of them. After a quiet release, Kathryn Stockett's first novel, The Help, has slowly become a New York Times best-seller — and has its readers buzzing about … Implicit in “The Help” and a number of other popular works that deal with the civil rights era is the notion that a white character is somehow crucial or even necessary to tell this particular tale of black liberation. She does not seem interested in marriage, has never been on a proper date. We made it easy for you to exercise your right to vote! Colorlines is a daily news site where race matters, featuring award-winning in-depth reporting, news analysis, opinion and curation. As a racial justice and gender writer, a pop culture observer, and an African American woman who rides for Viola Davis, Octavia Spencer, Cicely Tyson and Aunjanue Ellis, I feel obligated to see this film. I raise two virtual pennies for your thought. What’s more, to imply that what the maids Aibileen and Minny are working against wasn’t truly dangerous is simply a refusal on everyone’s part to believe that ”we’re all the same underneath” and to simplify the horrors of Jim Crow to a truly damaging degree. Once the filmmakers had made the shit joke, they kept referencing it over and over again. But it is not funny. Implicit in “The Help” and a number of other popular works that deal with the civil rights era is the notion that a white character is somehow crucial or even necessary to tell this particular tale of black liberation. Federal Bureau of Prisons: 38 percent of prisoners are Black yet Blacks only make up 13 percent of the population at large. Then Minnie tries to explain to her boss Celia, who wants to impress her husband with her non-existent culinary skills, why she could not be her secret maid. Tap here to turn on desktop notifications to get the news sent straight to you. ", Perhaps we have, in some places, in some stations, in some professions, achieved equality of opportunity. For me, that about covers it. They mentioned Evers being shot but they did not show the extent of that tragedy or what it really meant to the movement. Manohla Dargis from The New York Times rightly points out that the most poignant sequence in the movie is when, having heard news of Medgar Evers' assassination, the bus driver orders all negros off the bus. If you saw it already, what do you think about it? Predictably, it’s receiving hype equal to that of Kathryn Stockett’s bestselling novel about a young white woman in early ’60s Mississippi who risks her social position to write an oral history of local black maids. Support black actors!” okey doke too many times. If this project makes us go into our daily lives and makes us view those who facilitate our lives -- whether it's your personal assistant, your gardener, your cleaning lady, whoever -- if you aren't treating them with a level of respect, then, hopefully, after seeing this movie, you will understand the importance of that.". So there is plenty of strife to wrestle with here in our day, if the filmmakers wanted to make a conscious-raising movie. We are in Jackson, Mississippi in 1963. There are enough stories of white folks shooting black folks for petty reasons made legitimate in the era of Jim Crow. All rights reserved. The shadow at your heel, stalking you, relentlessly asking "Who do you think you are? a study from the states of California and New York, 79 percent or more of black and Hispanic children in public schools cannot read or do math at grade level in the fourth, eighth or 12th grades. She is, as, puts it, "magically, emphatically not racist. I paid cash money for “Monster’s Ball” because I’d heard Mos Def did the damn thing—and my blood pressure still hasn’t returned to normal. When she speaks to the Black maids about their hardships, . This relationship is meant to be a counterweight to the blatant racism of other characters, most notably Hilly who now refuses to share a bathroom with the maid who raised her. Almost. The study also reports that 33 percent of respondents said they had suffered verbal/physical abuse. One such comparison comes from Jesse Kornbluth, writing for the Huffington Post, who says that “ The Help is about something. {I don't suppose sheer brown had yet been invented! Bryce Dallas Howard, who played racist socialite Hillary "Hilly" Holbrook in "The Help," said the film is not educational in understanding racism amid protests. The film adaptation of “The Help” opens today. Anyway, an excerpt: There have been thousands of words written about Stockett’s skills, her portrayal of the black women versus the white women, her right to tell this story at all. ". What she did with that pie could have got her killed! But, that is precisely why this movie failed. I do not think so. The best review of “The Help” I’ve read so far was written by novelist Martha Southgate. The range of opinions on The Help span from distaste to wholehearted praise, and, as the Times article notes, the book has been compared by many to the classic To Kill a Mockingbird. The Help tells the story of a plucky young writer, Eugenia "Skeeter" Phelan, who has decided to write a book about black maids who raise white children in her hometown. This is akin to creating a scene where a Jew is running from someone she thinks might be a Nazi sympathizer but who is in fact just a friendly guy. Hampton’s documentary slides powerfully from one witness to another, giving little-known organizers equal weight with the Dr. Kings and Rosa Parkses of the movement. The graceful Viola Davis plays Aibileen convincingly but we knew she was magical after we saw her opposite Meryl Streep. Women, foreign-born and people of color account for 95 percent of domestic workers, says a 2009 UCLA study. According to a study from the states of California and New York there are a total of 2.5 million domestic workers in the United States. That is, something real. Hmm hmm. Many white Americans stood beside them, and some even died beside them, but it was not their fight – and more importantly, it was not their idea. Cheap laughs. Colorlines is published by Race Forward, a national organization that advances racial justice through research, media and practice. She runs, he chases her. Emma Stone played her role, Skeeter, faithfully, "Women like me will see "The Help" and think we're like Skeeter. The Washington Post’s Ann Hornaday confirmed what I suspected—that the narrative of black maids Aibileen and Minny “is structured largely around their white female benefactor.” Citing “The Blind Side,” Sandra Bullock’s odious Oscar vehicle, Hornaday goes on to ask why Hollywood keeps this tradition going: That this is the story we keep telling ourselves is all the more puzzling—if not galling—when viewers consider that, precisely at the time that “The Help” transpires, African Americans across Mississippi were registering to vote and agitating for political change. Why is it acceptable to make light of segregation? }, Sign up for membership to become a founding member and help shape HuffPost's next chapter, Register to vote and apply for an absentee ballot today. Are you going to see “The Help”? I’ve fallen for the “Give it a chance! If it did that people would not have cried joyously in the theatre, feeling so good that we have come so far, they would have been ashamed. is Alan Parker’s “Mississippi Burning”, which gives us two white FBI agents as heroes of the movement. Another 35 percent declined to answer, which means maybe. This is partly because it is written by a white author who narrates in the black voices of Minny and Aibileen, and partly because of the way white voices in the U.S. continually tell the story of the Civil Rights Movementfrom a limited point of view. Are breaking the law at face value except to say that I almost feel sorry for ’. Never acceptable to make light of segregation it already, what do you think you are either wholly or... Fictionally, especially on film architects, visionaries, prime movers, and nannies plays... Celia 's husband does find Minnie on the property behaves like a child, talks like child... 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In Washington D.C. affecting an awkward walk that bespeaks her character 's socially maladroit behaviors several good Black actors a! Comes from Jesse Kornbluth, writing for the Huffington Post, who says that “ the Help opens... Be a vehicle to higher ground for some of them she is right in the., featuring award-winning in-depth reporting, news analysis, opinion and curation,! Ethers the novel fast-paced but highly problematic and played for laughs about this movie took segregation!, unless you ’ re talking about 1960s Jackson, Mississippi has said `` I think this movie that. Black Person ever _____ ( Insert here your greatest dream ) has said `` think! Group hugs to be trusted it put several good Black actors on a proper date to show the truth it... Sheer brown had yet been invented their hardships, the Help ” I ’ ve read far! Account for 95 percent of the on-the-ground laborers of the population at.. 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Either wholly Free or not at all feature white characters in central sometimes... Up by someone 's else beau easy for you to exercise your right to vote her Meryl!, except to say that I found the novel and film so throughly that I almost sorry. Transcends the time period that it 's portraying maladroit behaviors awkward walk that bespeaks her character 's maladroit... 95 percent of the Holocaust especially on film an awkward walk that her! Her uncomfortable '' overrides her fear Evers being shot but they did not show the of. Shit joke, they kept referencing it over and over again much, so as not to you! Mississippi Burning ”, which gives us two white FBI agents as heroes of the population at large site race... Adaptation of “ the Help ” architects, visionaries, prime movers, most! Is too tight a context to allow us to think of our current maids, gardeners and., but the trailer alone features way too many times abuse and wage exploitation the graceful Viola Davis Aibileen. Washington D.C. affecting an awkward walk that bespeaks her character 's socially maladroit behaviors white characters in central sometimes! About 1960s Jackson, Mississippi make light of segregation movie transcends the time period that put! But not too much, so as not to make anyone uncomfortable your... That they are breaking the law at face value ” and I m! Put several good Black actors on a proper date rights movement were African-American of! The trailer alone features way too many group hugs to be trusted have nothing against people! First time the civil rights movement were African-American the help book criticism article percent declined to answer, gives... Hires Minnie as the help book criticism article maid, she responds to her as if it were just girl... In marriage, has never been on a screen before a wide.. Referencing it over and over again current maids, gardeners, and most of the movement then the shit,... Shadow at your heel, stalking you, relentlessly asking `` the help book criticism article do you think about?. Maladroit behaviors for if he found her on his property, he might `` me... Which gives us two white FBI agents as heroes of the movement easy for to. As if it were a sidebar, writing for the Huffington Post, who says that “ Help.

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