Elesha Barnette
+ Follow‘The Help’: the 1960s Weren’t That Bad, Fried Chicken and Viola Davis
“The Help”, adapted from the popular book by Kathryn Stockett of the same name, explores the racial tensions that existed in the world of women in Jackson, Mississippi, during the 1960s. The film primarily tells the story of Eugenia “Skeeter” Phelan (Emma Stone), an eager graduate of the University of Mississippi, who has returned home with dreams of becoming a writer. Her quest finds her compiling the stories of Jackson’s ill-treated maids– referred to as ‘the help’ –in an effort to find her voice and write something meaningful.
Her primary sources are Aibileen Clark (Viola Davis) and Minny Jackson (Octavia Spencer). Complete opposites, Aibileen is the quiet, reflective type. Minnie is feisty and boisterous. Both women have spent their entire lives raising white children who in turn become their bosses once they are of age. These sweet children-turned racists, embodied by Hilly Holbrook (Bryce Dallas Howard) and the rest of the ‘mean girls’, then set about making life miserable for the underpaid, under-appreciated Clark, Spencer and countless others.
The movie also features Sissy Spacek, Allison Janney, the quite refreshing Jessica Chastain and the iconic Cicely Tyson.
I openly admit I have not read the novel, so if it is as light-hearted as the movie felt… then apologies to the movie’s auteurs ahead of time for my criticism of them simply staying true to the text:
The 1960s Weren’t That Bad Evidently
For anyone who has done any research as to what life was truly like in the 1960s for black Mississippian’s this movie falls short of painting a realistic backdrop of the hell on earth it really was. Yes it was uncomfortable to watch quite a few scenes, but there were no knots in my stomach. After all I’ve seen footage of 1960s water hoses being turned on peaceful protesters, pictures of the swinging, burnt remains of lynching victims and the bloodthirsty crowds that rathered see James Meredith dead than he dare be allowed to enter the white walls of Ole Miss. I really had to suspend my disbelief to get into the story.
I am not suggesting that this movie should have been dark and gritty (it’s not that kind of story), but I am accusing it of not capturing the atmosphere of the times. Save the scene in which Viola Davis desperately runs home after being let off the bus due the Medgar Evers’ shooting, I sometimes felt I had no context for the story being told. Having more clearly established the setting would have given the story a much heavier arc and raised the stakes for all involved just a bit more (including the audience).
All in all the movie is reminiscent of “the Secret Life of Bees” and “Driving Miss Daisy” in its approach to the re-telling of one of America’s most ruthless, inhuman eras. While these are some of my favorite films, ultimately I always come away feeling like “the 1960s weren’t that bad at all!” and maybe I would be one of those lucky black folks to have made friends with a tolerant even accepting white person. Doubtful.
Fried Chicken
I was personally disturbed when Octavia Spencer’s character, Minny Jackson, grabbed a piece of fried chicken and took a big heaping bite. It was too evocative of Hollywood’s ‘golden age’ when Mammy ruled the silver screen. Being from the south I know fried chicken is a staple at many a dinner table, but in all my life I have never seen it consumed in the ways black people have been repeatedly shown to greedily gobble it up. In that moment I felt the director betrayed the story, took away Minny Jackson’s dignity and joined a long line of directors who for some reason think this is acceptable comic relief. It’s not. It never will be.
Viola Davis
While I do enjoy Emma Stone in any movie, Viola Davis is the real reason to see this film. Her performance hangs heavy in the air, unfettered and unencumbered by the blithe re-telling of what life for maids in 1960s Mississippi was like. Watching her on screen is like watching an entirely different film. She cuts through the gloss to give the movie the texture it needs. Her performance fools me into believing this is an Oscar-worthy film. The scenes between Davis and Mae Mobley (twins, Eleanor and Emma Henry- where did they find these talented kids?!) never seem forced. Davis renders a performance that warrants your trip to the theater.
Jackson Mississippi
Lastly, I hear most of the movie was actually filmed in Greenwood, Mississippi, and a good thing it was because just last week in Jackson, James Craig Anderson, an African American man, was beaten and then run over by a group of white teens. Led by 18-year-old Deryl Dedmon Jr., the group shouted “white power” amongst other racially charged epithets while completing their night’s mission to “f**k with some niggers.” I guess things never changed in Jackson despite Kathryn Stockett’s book.
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16 Responses to ‘The Help’: the 1960s Weren’t That Bad, Fried Chicken and Viola Davis
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chuck hobbs says:
Great article!
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Elesha, I told my 15 year old niece that the scene in which "Minnie" tricks her tormenter into eating a pie filled with defecation would have resulted in her lynching, as well as the lynching of others she was related to….
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Elesha_Barnette says:
Thanks for the comments!
Elisabeth, I totally agree and I would never discourage anyone from seeing the movie. The more it makes at the box office the better the chances of similar movies being made in the future.
And yes Chuck! Ms. Minnie would have been swinging before the sun went down. It is up to those who know to inform others of the realities of that time period. Has your niece seen Eyes on the Prize? I recommend it to any and everyone who wants to know what the 1960s were really like.
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MGPTHOC says:
Turn back time a bit further to Jones County, MS (ca: 1880’s?) where a white man burned down a "white" school because they would not let in his illegitimate "black" children. (was it because they were black or because he abandoned his first wife- who was white and first children?) Or what about today where 2 black women in FL enslave another black woman – for 20 years? Today a black is 5-10 times more likely to be murderd by who? Another black.
Watch the Perry shows – where blacks solve their own problems and stop blaiming everybody else.
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What the 60’s were really like?
Being a product of 60’s, Today I am still amazed of the blacks and whites that still come by my dad’s farm who used to work there. They’ll go out of their way, even families who have grown children , who live in Miami, FL, to come and visit and talk about the fond memories of my grandfather. A few years ago, a “black” man and his wife (in their 80’s) were picking butterbeans in my dads field early one morning. I had been deer hunting and walking back to truck saw them and spoke to them. Learned they had worked for Grandad back in “60’s”. Did they have to pick peas, drive a beat up looking Ford truck they were in? Doubt it, since all 6 of their children were very successful, one even playing professional sports. They just like to do it – to be self sufficient.
Similar to my wife’s relatives (I found later) that I grew up with his daughters and they lived down the road. They lived in a 3-room clap-board house (similar to my g-grandmother 1880’s house) and always drove used trucks. Both “races” had issues. -
One of the best "family" reunions I've had was last year with the "black" side in Quincy, FL – decendants of slaves from my gg-greatuncle who took my families last name. The older ones saw "histiry". The younger seem to see "color" and question why me and my family were there.
If you want to talk about “violence” and imply it was just blacks who were targeted – grow up. Blacks targeted truck drivers in rural Georgia they knew were hauling produce. Back then they typically also had cash. My father was one. They tried to stand in road to block him – to get him to stop. If he had I would not be here. Later it was found they had killed others.
There is good and bad in both. I really wish people would stop trying to imply it was one-sided. As today stats point out, blacks target blacks and probably target whites even more so (see TX case a few years ago where two blacks targeted a “white” neighborhood. They paid with their lives when grandfather, defending himself shot both – and both were illegal aliens)
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I always heard how “blacks” had to live under sharecropping – a system supposedly set up to just control x-slaves. Well, guess what? My granddad was a sharecropper till he was in his 40’s. He got ticked when land owner tried to steal money from tomatoes he grew renting another guys place! He told the other’s foreman to kiss his a…. This was in 1957, He bought the farm my dad and uncle live on today in 1958. He died in 1967. The farm was paid off about 1972! I was helping carry irrigation pipes in tomatoes fields then. Do not try to tell me about “oppression.” I saw that crap at FAMU for 7 years. Yet, there are blacks On these threads, same as whites then, that call us “white trash.” Grow up!
I met “real” Africans like Dr Nywoga also, whom taught Biology. Good man. He wondered why blacks in this country acted they way they did – wanted it given to them.
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http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/pdf/bvvc.pdf
Look on page 5 : 4/5ths offenders of black victims were black. A LOT More times than by “whites.” Blacks murder each other at a rate of 5,000 per year. Think about it. The Tuskegee report list a few over 7,000 were hanged in the years between 1890-1920. Many of whom were white. Many were wrongful. Many were actual Criminals. There were 8 “legal” hangings in St Augustine, FL before ca. 1904 – for actual crimes – not all were black. Seems you better start worrying about something other than this keeping false stereo type – “the white man out to get you.” We are either going to have to learn to work together and stop using symbols and excuses, or just keep repeating same mistakes over and over.
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KathyB says:
Sadly, Emmet Till was found murdered in August 1955 just six miles from where the film was shot in Greenwood, MS. I agree with you that I regret that they didn't make me feel as nervous as I should have been for their safety. The book did build up the tension a little more. Ms. Davis really elevates this movie with her incredible talent.
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http://gvnet.com/humantrafficking/USA.htm
Notice this was an African who enslaved another in the US! http://gvnet.com/humantrafficking/USA.htm
"Shyima was 10 when a wealthy Egyptian couple brought her from a poor village in northern Egypt to work in their California home. She awoke before dawn and often worked past midnight to iron their clothes, mop the marble floors and dust the family's crystal. She earned $45 a month working up to 20 hours a day. She had no breaks during the day and no days off."
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http://suncoastpinellas.tbo.com/content/2009/may/…
Slavery in FLorida. Notice these are white and black slavers working together to enslave others. It is not about "race" it is about Crimminals.
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This women is doing something about real – today's – crime:
Human trafficking victim speaks out in Aiken
NBC News, Augusta,-September-15-2008
http://www.nbcaugusta.com/news/southcarolina/28434359.ht...[access date unavailable]
Micheline Slattery talked about how at just five she was forced into slavery in her native Haiti. At 14, she was sold for $2,500 and brought to the United States. Slattery described how she was forced to do housework and essentially serve as an unpaid nanny.
"It is really tough when you have been programmed to believe you are worthless," she said. "I was like, there had to be something different, something better than what I was living. I decided I wasn't going to stay there anymore and ran away." Now Slattery is a nurse and when she can, she tells her story. "I want the world to know that slavery is not history, it still exists," she said.
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mgpthoc says:
Black Confederate sharpshooter of MS and the reason we have "Teddy bears":
http://www.mississippiscv.org/collier.htmSo we should ask, why did this Southern, former slave AND Confederate sharpshooter, black man not have problems yet those who came to stir up something did?
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Elesha- I totally agree with you that the movie sugar coated the subject matter. But on the plus side, the positive Hollywood take on this subject encourages many more people to see the movie than would do so if it was a sad picture. The Masses are now learning about the atrocities that took place in the 60′s (and unfortunately now too). Yes, it paints a more positive picture than reality, but the positive nature attracts more people to learn. All the best and thank you for your thoughful review.