I started writing this last night and then, as I often do, I started criticizing it... wondering if it was good enough or accurate enough or too offensive or...
I've decided though, throughout the inner debates of the night that I should just be me. So here goes....
The Movie itself was pretty good. I liked the actors and actresses. I did find myself emotionally invested in the characters... enough that I spent part of the movie crying because of the injustices and unfairness that was being imposed upon the colored maids by the 'high society' white women. The theme that courage isn't always facing danger directly but doing what's right ... I loved that. I loved the humor mixed in with the drama and over all it was a pretty good movie, My first comment after seeing it, was that it was a worthy movie. So many movies and shows today are made, it seems, with no character development, flashy effects, bad dialogue, crude, vulgar language disguising shallow, half cooked plots. The Help was over all a good movie.
For me, it was also thought provoking. Racism has always been a very touchy, sensitive subject. We, as a society, try to brush it under the rug, so to speak, and pretend it doesn't exist today. but it does.
Ever since the creation of people there has always been the classification of higher and lower... better and worse... Whether it be Egyptians ordering jewish slaves, Nazi's and Jews, White people and black people.... whatever it is....
It boggles my mind what human beings are capable of doing to other human beings. Why people take differences and use it as an excuse to place themselves 'over' somebody else. And why society as a whole follows the misguided beliefs of a few?
I hated Hilly's character in the Help. But we can't forget that at the time, her belief was the belief of most Americans. Her attitude towards black people was the attitude of much of the countries population in the early sixties. We look back on them with judgement and distaste and we hope our attitudes towards each other have changed and are better and I think for most people it is. But if we're honest with ourselves, do we not look at people of different races with skepticism and maybe even a little bit of fear?
Aren't we in the midst of a decade long war because of different beliefs and ideas?
Anyhow... Those are my thoughts on 'The Help'. It made me think and thoroughly entertained me.
Here's to "The Naughty!"
