Movie Review: The Help
Wow. This is the movie that had so many people talking? Talk about Hollywood tripe. First of all, to all those who call it empowering for the black maids-- what??? A white woman comes into their lives, uses them to write a book, runs off to NY. And this empowers THEM? They got $46 out of it. Granted, that's about $500 or so today but still.
Second, and more importantly, the movie sure ended at a rather...fortuitous point, didn't it? Before the worst of the reprisals. Yes, we saw the apparently only decent white family in the entire town, inviting Minny to dinner and holding her chair for her. We also saw Aibileen lose her job. How long is $46 going to last her? Not long. And what next? She has no more chances in that city. The KKK recently killed someone in that city. Who are they going to go after next? And what then? Miss Big NY journalist Skeeter is going to write their obituaries?
Other than the plot holes and problems, the movie was typical Hollywood except that Skeeter did not get the guy at the end. Though, really, the whole thing was just sloppily written. A few characters undergo personality transfusions somewhere between scenes, it seems. Suddenly, they just change. No explanations. Bad writing. Just... ugh.
"The Long Walk Home" at least shows some of what was going on, though in Montgomery, not Jackson. At least there, everything doesn't take place in an atmosphere which reminds me of "Mean Girls", though 40 years earlier, and with a slightly older in crowd.
Second, and more importantly, the movie sure ended at a rather...fortuitous point, didn't it? Before the worst of the reprisals. Yes, we saw the apparently only decent white family in the entire town, inviting Minny to dinner and holding her chair for her. We also saw Aibileen lose her job. How long is $46 going to last her? Not long. And what next? She has no more chances in that city. The KKK recently killed someone in that city. Who are they going to go after next? And what then? Miss Big NY journalist Skeeter is going to write their obituaries?
Other than the plot holes and problems, the movie was typical Hollywood except that Skeeter did not get the guy at the end. Though, really, the whole thing was just sloppily written. A few characters undergo personality transfusions somewhere between scenes, it seems. Suddenly, they just change. No explanations. Bad writing. Just... ugh.
"The Long Walk Home" at least shows some of what was going on, though in Montgomery, not Jackson. At least there, everything doesn't take place in an atmosphere which reminds me of "Mean Girls", though 40 years earlier, and with a slightly older in crowd.