With his adaptation of Kathryn Stockett's best-selling novel The Help, director Tate Taylor serves up the finest film of the summer. Few films manage to provoke both hysterical laughter and streams of tears in their audiences, but The Help succeeds swimmingly in blending uproarious comedy with overwhelming tragedy, often within a single scene. The resulting concoction of mixed genres and stirred emotions provides a savory treat that would make any one of the film's savvy housekeepers proud.
Set in Jackson, Miss. in the early 1960s, The Help revolves primarily around two distinct and disparate groups of women: the housewives and the 'help.' The film presents the white wives and mothers of Jackson as polished portraits of complacency. Led by the smiley yet sinister Hilly Holbrook, played terrifically by Bryce Dallas Howard, these well-dressed women cling to the status quo; they worship the so-called 'old way' as they engage in endless efforts to recreate the immaculate households of their now-aging mothers. As they embark on this quest to foster the prettiest home and to raise the loveliest children, the so-called 'Southern belles' of Jackson turn, without fail, to the help.
Jackson's 'help' consists of the scores of women of virtually all ages who transcend labels such as 'housekeeper' and 'caretaker' in their undying commitment to their tasks. While the film introduces its audience to a variety of members of this underpaid, under-appreciated and tremendously talented group, it focuses largely on Minny Jackson and Aibileen Clark. With her portrayal of the suitably sassy Minny, Octavia Spencer offers up the lion's share of the film's laughs and puts forth moments of brilliant physical comedy. Meanwhile, at the other end of the dramatic spectrum, Aibileen, played with rich emotion and poignant depth by the versatile Viola Davis, embodies the tragedy of the South's vicious discrimination, which keeps one race permanently beneath the other. While Aibileen's scenes with the daughter of the woman she serves showcase her dedication and her competency, her finest moments emerge when she agrees to share her life story with Eugenia "Skeeter" Phelan, an unmarried young white woman who longs to expose the injustice of Jackson's racial divide in a work of epic journalism. The interviewing sequences between Davis's Aibileen and Emma Stone's Skeeter glow with unrivaled theatrical energy. They also speak to the film's larger themes, which go beyond mere condemnations of racial injustice.
The Help functions fantastically well as both a class-conscious comedy and a searing drama. It even works wonderfully as a polished period piece, complete with vintage Coca-Cola bottles, excessive heaps of Crisco and the roar of 1960s-era automobiles, all backed by the throbbing falsetto of Frankie Valli and the raspy mumblings of Bob Dylan. However, The Help need not rest on mere period details. Its messages concerning the dangers of complacency, the undying need for equality and the importance of the arts as instruments of change should always ring true.
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