THE HELP PORTRAYS MISSISSIPPI IN 1963
What if Black women in Jackson, Mississippi, could have told about their lives in 1963? Caucasian novelist Kathryn Stockett tries to do so—after being rejected by sixty literary agents–in The Help (2009), which has now been brought to the screen by director Tate Taylor. Just about the only occupation for an African American women in those days was as housemaid, who would clean, cook, bring up White children from infancy, and put up with mistreatment from those who hire them. In pretentious Jackson, White women dress up for bridge parties in their homes after “the help” clean up the living rooms, prepare sumptuous hors d’oeurvres or buffets, and clean up afterwards, returning home to their children and evening meals without having to do anything but make sure that their personal appearances are well manicured, presumably ready to please their husbands obsequiously. One such child is Eugenia “Skeeter” Phelan (played by Emma Stone), who has just completed a college degree, presumably as an English major, at Ole Miss. Although her application to work for a New York publisher is turned down for lack of experience, she now returns to Jackson to begin her writing career. She talks her way into a job as a Q&A columnist for the local newspaper but knows so little about life that she asks a Black maid, Aibeleen Clark (played by Viola Davis), for advice on what to write. But her real interest is in the perspective of female Black help on the dawn of the civil rights movement. What she hears is more than an earful, especially from another maid, Minnie Jackson (played by Octavia Spencer). What filmviewers see is more than an eyeful as well! Prejudice against Blacks is so thick that there is an entire publication on the complex law of segregation in Mississippi. White women insist that Black women should not use their toilets at home for fear of catching strange diseases. Evidently Skeeter’s tale about Aibeleen and Minnie is so impressive that the New York publisher wants more. And after the assassination of Medgar Evers and other incidents, Black housemaids are no longer reluctant to share their experiences. Today, half a century later, America has a Black president, but The Help provokes interest in a sequel—to find out whether anything has fundamentally changed in Mississippi since then. For portraying human rights issues, the Political Film Society has nominated The Help as best film on human rights of 2011. MH
TEN POLITICAL FILMS REVIEWED BY LEFT-WING WEBSITE
The San Francisco-based website www.AlterNet.org has identified ten Hollywood films that punish humans in various ways. The writer, initially reflecting on The Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011), puts The Day After Tomorrow (2004) at the top of the list. Other films reviewed are 2012 (2009), Outbreak (1995), Children of Men (2006), Battle Royale (2000), Knowing (2009), Dr. Strangelove (1964), Soylent Green (1973), The Day After (1983), and The Happening (2008). The link to the ten reviews is as follows: http://www.alternet.org/story/152177/10_best_movies_where_humanity_gets_its_comeuppance?akid=7470.196050.vHQXPE&rd=1&t=9