Susan Granger’s review of “The Help” (DreamWorks/Disney)
Adroitly adapted from Kathryn Stockett’s controversial 2009 novel, it’s the very personal story of three women in Jackson, Mississippi, in the early 1960s. Ambitious Eugenia ‘Skeeter’ Phelan (Emma Stone), an Ole Miss grad, wants to be an author and, while she lands a job ghostwriting a ‘cleaning advice’ column for the local newspaper, a New York book editor (Mary Steenburgen) says she can only succeed if she writes something personal – and timely.
Knowing little about cleaning, Skeeter seeks advice from her friend’s maid Aibileen (Viola Davis), but chatting with hired help doesn’t sit well with the brittle belles of the segregationist bridge club. So inquisitive Skeeter goes out, secretly, at night, to Aibileen’s house and begins to question what it feels like to be a black servant, taking care of white people’s babies. After all, Aibileen’s raised 17 white children, often becoming their surrogate mother. Aibileen’s understandably reluctant at first but soon she’s sharing her suffering, including how her only son was killed by racist negligence after a mill accident.
This kind of fraternization not only breaks Southern societal rules but also puts them at risk of the law. But soon Aibileen’s saucy, outspoken friend Minny (Octavia Spencer) decides to confide in open-minded Skeeter, as do a dozen other maids, telling their poignant tales of domestic life, particularly mistreatment by perky Southern replicas of Betty Draper in TV’s “Mad Men.” Like Hilly (Bryce Dallas Howard), a malicious racist whose spitefulness offends everyone, including her mother (Sissy Spacek); Elizabeth (Ahna O’Reilly), who deliberately neglects her plump, toddler daughter; Skeeter’s own ailing mother (Allison Janney) who inexplicably fired their beloved, longtime maid Constantine (Cicily Tyson); and hapless Celia (Jessica Chastain), a shunned newcomer who’s considered ‘white trash.’
Adapted and directed by Kathryn Stockett’s observant childhood friend Tate Taylor, it resounds with sensitive emotional truth, even if it’s episodic and uneven, lacking subtlety. The acting ensemble is superb, particularly Viola Davis and scene-stealing Octavia Spencer.
On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “The Help” is a provocative, powerful 9, a multi-racial, multi-generational ‘must see.’
