The Help

Bring your kleenexes and prepare to see Oscar-worthy material and actresses. Once in a while, a book tugs at your heartstrings so strongly; you can’t help but fall in love with the characters and the storyline, especially if it’s real. Kathryn Stockett debut novel is a sheer tour-de-force filled with real emotions, real characters and real importance. The story is set in Jackson, Mississipi in 1962 and although it’s fictional, much of what transpired during that troubled time is captured brilliantly in the book. Stockett, who hails from Jackson herself and developed a strong bond with her family’s maid, Demetrie, tells the story of three women who will come together in a dangerous way, in a time of civil unrest. Skeeter returns from college, determined to be a writer. When she is challenged by an editor at Harper and Row to write about something that matters to her, she decides to interview the black maids who have raised the children of Jackson in a tell-all viewpoint from the help. Of course, with a book that runs 522-pages long, the screenwriters had to pick a course and a tone for the movie, and I assume they struggled with two directions: One possible route would’ve been to focus on the political unrest and the divide between blacks and whites in Mississipi, the second one was to focus on the strong relationships that developed between the maids, their employers and the babies they raised. I was glad to see they chose the latter. However, in order to truly convey the raw and powerful emotions that were stirred in the book, a stellar cast was put together. Emma Stone, whom you won’t remember from duds such as Zombieland, The House Bunny or Easy A, comes into her own and delivers a brilliant performance as Eugenia "Skeeter" Phelan. Viola Davis delivers a performance worthy of an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress as Aibeleen and Octavia Spencer is brilliant as her sassy-mouthed sidekick. Add to that Bryce Dallas Howard as Hilly, the mean-spirited racist and Sissy Spacek as her mother, and a title song (The Living Proof) by Mary J Blige and this movie can only understandably gather Oscar-buzz all around it. This movie, filled with laughter and poignant moments is definitely worth all 150 minutes.