The Help

Sometimes, things really are black and white. The conflict in the civil rights drama The Help is concerned with a fiery war that pits African American maids against horrible white women who are ignorant of their ignorance. And there is no room for any grey area. No one within a hundred feet of a theatre screening this movie will be confused about who we're supposed to cheer for and who we're supposed to cheer against. The heroes are nice and the villains are mean. The movie smells like a pre-packaged crowd-pleaser interested only in simplifying the intended emotional reaction. But then something unexpected happens. It pleases. Adapting Kathryn Stockett's novel of the same name, writer/director Tate Taylor surrenders the narrative to star Viola Davis and she makes the story sing.

In a performance that absolutely alters the dramatic potential of the movie entirely for the better, Davis brings emotional depth to a story that would be shallow without her. She plays Aibileen, a housemaid who has raised multiple Caucasian children and received next to no respect for it from the racially divided community of Jackson, Mississippi. She's long since accepted her woeful lot in life, but things take a surprising turn when aspiring writer Skeeter (Emma Stone) returns home from college and decides to start interviewing Aibileen about her housekeeping and child-rearing experiences. What begins as a few questions soon blossoms into a friendship that leads Skeeter to write a book from the perspective of The Help.

Since this is the early 60s in the Deep South, Skeeter's plan must exist in secrecy and so it takes a while for the writer to get more African American maids on board with her project. But as the fires of racism burn ever brighter in Jackson, it becomes clear that this is the time for change. So Skeeter gets her maids and her book gets its anecdotes and the movie gets its opportunity to tug at the audience's heartstrings. Taylor isn't interested in stepping outside the pretty feel-good box of uplifting Hollywood pictures, so the narrative treads safe, familiar territory all the way. But while his handling of the story is predictable and unoriginal, he proves to be quite skilled at making this obvious approach expressively engaging.

It doesn't really feel new or fresh, but Taylor's direction still works. He has an impressive sense of pacing (the bulky 146-minute running time zooms by) and he wisely protects the movie from giving into the temptation of laughably rendered treacle. The expected moments of score-swelling triumph are still present, but Taylor approaches these occurrences with touching honesty. It's all enough to make The Help a sweet success for which Taylor deserves much credit, but despite all of this, his greatest contribution to the movie lies in the trust he exhibits in Davis.

Since much of the movie is Skeeter listening to Aibileen tell her impassioned stories, Davis is given many opportunities to shine. And Taylor just hands the movie over to her. Instead of activating a flashback every time Aibileen dips into her memories, Taylor simply leaves the camera on her face and lets her speak. It's the single most joyous aspect of the entire movie that Davis's performance is given the time and attention it deserves. It even feels like a dodged bullet at times, considering that Taylor does employ flashbacks in other areas of the narrative. One of the flashbacks doesn't even make much sense in the context that it is delivered. So it's not like Taylor doesn't enjoy a good flashback, but his decision to avoid this narrative tactic with Aibileen works wonders.

Two more great performances are delivered by Stone, whose sparkling, sure-footed charm knows no bounds, and Jessica Chastain, whose character Celia joins Stone's Skeeter as the only other white woman in the movie who isn't a cluelessly racist jerk. Stone inhabits her role as the outsider so convincingly that her arc is believable and her contribution to the story of change is potent. Chastain has a complicated juggling act of a role as a woman who is giggling one moment and crying the next. She's a bit of an emotional basket case, but Chastain never plays either emotion too high or too low. She finds truth in both Celia's happiness and sadness and she explores the space between so her performance never feels comically extended to satisfy either end of the broad emotional spectrum.

As good as the heroes of this story are (and Octavia Spencer is also quite fun as a fast-talking, no-nonsense maid who operates as the movie's comic relief), the villains are where things get ugly. Well, specifically Bryce Dallas Howard's hell-bent harpy Hilly, around whom almost all of the other women revolve. If there's evil in Jackson, it probably looks a little like Hilly. Or maybe a lot. Most of the other women are just following suit and they're all a bit silly in their hateful ways, too. But Hilly takes it to another level. Her character is so despicable, so nasty and mean that I'm surprised I wasn't actually prompted to audibly "boo" the screen whenever she appeared on it.

It's not all Howard's fault, either. Her performance is certainly the weakest of the bunch, but it can't be easy to go up against the likes of Davis, Stone, and Chastain. It doesn't help that her character is written to be a cardboard cut-out that doubles as punching bag. Hilly is as over-the-top as Aibileen is grounded. Howard shrieks and scowls her way through the role, only stopping occasionally to flash a soulless grin that devours the movie's chances of achieving effective antagonism. The weakness of The Help's villain and the strength of its heroines make for an unbalanced narrative, but as ridiculously etched as Hilly is, she can't stop her enemies from making a dramatic impact.

So the conflict really is black and white and the movie telegraphs its emotions rather blatantly, but for all of the movie's flaws, Taylor knows that the key to unleashing the power of this story lies in the ability of his actors. Sure, Howard flops, but the character practically guarantees that. Stone and Chastain provide solid work and aid the movie in defining its message and expanding its dramatic potential. But at the centre of it all is Davis, whose performance is so strong that it singlehandedly elevates the movie to a place seemingly beyond its reach. She is utterly astonishing in her ability to push powerful emotions to the surface without resorting to sentimentalizing her role. She makes Aibileen a remarkably memorable character. She saves the movie, as only a hero could do.