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A moving drama about black suffering at the hands of cruel white women. Tate Taylor’s period drama The Help (2011) is an interesting movie, a well made film, stuffed with talented actresses, as well as full of compelling performances from all of its actresses. However, it merely manages to brush the surface of race relations in America, instead The Help offers a safe and neat space to hail white saviors just helping out the black community. It’s ironic that that author of The Help didn’t even get permission to tell this story apparently. You find sympathy within the characters from the moving performances, but The Help resorts to too many stereotypes to feel meaningful. Tate Taylor’s direction is solid, but the real star is the cast. Viola Davis is jaw dropping as a maid forced by poverty to raise white children, whose parents are negligible at best, as she must learn to stand up for herself against her pale tyrants in a tear jerking lead actress performance. Likewise, Octavia Spencer is wonderful as a tough maid and cook forced to endure endless hardships, so Spencer brings an intensity and energy to this whirlwind character. I must mention Cicely Tyson gives a wondrous performance as an old maid that raised Emma Stone’s character. Then, I should say that David Oyelowo makes a nice cameo as an inspiringly kind preacher. I love Emma Stone in The Help so much that it’s actually the role that convinced me she could seriously act. She finds strength to withstand mean girls and rude boys, so that her character can achieve a career as a writer. Her large blue eyes wide open say everything as to how affected Stone was by this role. Bryce Dallas Howard goes into next level acting with arguably the greatest performance in The Help. For such a warm, kind, and bubbly actress, Howard transforms herself into the most vile, hateful, spiteful, cowardly, loathsome racist maybe ever in a film. I hope people look back see how impressive Bryce Dallas Howard’s effortless and unforgettable performance is in The Help. On the other hand, Jessica Chastain is so warm and friendly in a very sweet and moving role within The Help. Sissy Spacek also gets to deliver a fun and memorable role as Bryce’s mother. I love how many talented redheaded actresses are in The Help. I also enjoyed seeing Mary Steenburgen as Emma Stone’s New York editor. Allison Janney kills it as Emma Stone’s racist and misguided mother. Ahna O’Reilly is excellent as a cowardly suburban mother who just goes along with whatever Bryce’s horrid character says since she has no spine. Anna Camp similarly concurs with whatever Bryce wills with an empty shallow lady figure in The Help. Dana Ivey gets her moment to shine as a repulsively racist government representative. For all the ladies’ great acting, the guys do not impress.Read full review
Verified purchase: Yes | Condition: Pre-owned
This was an exceptionally insightful film about what it was like to be a house maid in the South in the 1960s. It meant being available but not noticeable. It meant doing your job without asking questions. The chocolate pie sequence was absolutely hilarious. While the overall film was different in many ways from the book, it still maintained the same sense of "required invisibility" on the part of the Black help that was so prevalent in the South during that time period..
Verified purchase: Yes | Condition: New
This movie is spot on in portraying the very courageous black women who suffered untold oppression and insult while employed as domestic servants. The actor characters are the best. My wife and I have watched and will watch this movie again with family and friends because it touches our heart. These ladies were some very brave and Godly women! Buy this movie and share it with everyone you know.
Verified purchase: Yes | Condition: New
Hello, I have listened to the unabridged audio book first, which was wonderful in its description of the complicated relationships between mothers and daughters, friends, couples and black and white human beings obscured by the mechanics of society. To me this is not a pretty book, it is an honest to the core of the characters, story telling book. I feel that in comparison the movie depicts the protagonists too pretty and perfect. One of the main characters "Skeeter" , who sets the hole plot in motion, is not all that distinct from her friends in the beginning of the story, In fact she is a close friend all of her life with Hilly, the biggest racist and instigator in the story. Skeeter has some notions of something being wrong in the big picture, but she becomes a different person only through the experience being stripped of her beloved maid and later creating "the Help" with some black women of her hometown. To me the movie got it in reverse, Skeeter has that different more sophisticated look and attire from the get go. I understand that a movie has to set the stage in order to tell a story in an abbreviated and somewhat quicker way, but in this case your loosing out big time if you hurry, there is so much to be heard in this book. In this case I feel more drawn to a non prefabricated point of view and experience. Therefore I personally recommend the book or the audio book over the movie, it kept me occupied for weeks after finishing it. Greetings, OliverRead full review
I grew up in Vicksburg in the 50's and 60's and do remember those times. This movie, which I've watched several times, both entertained me and made me ashamed as well. The movie was well done and the acting was well deserving of all of the awards it received. I highly recommend it to all ages as a step back in history to the deep south and to the beginning of the end of segregation in Mississippi.
Verified purchase: Yes | Condition: New
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