Review - The Help

Grade: B+

Good: An affecting, heartwarming account of the trials of African-American maids in the early 1960s anchored by superb performances by Viola Davis and Octavia Spencer; Character development abounds, even amongst the supporting cast.

Bad: Overstuffed by too many plot threads, leaving some underserved; A bit long at two and a half hours; Emma Stone wilts in the presence of stronger actors like Davis.

Ugly: It’s the story of African-Americans in Mississippi. In the 1960s. Probably doesn’t get much uglier than the way they were treated

Mad Men is pretty popular, right? Its precise restoration of the world of advertising in 1960s New York coupled with its incisive critique of American life during that period has won more than its share of critics and, to a significantly lesser degree, viewers. For a while, Mad Men stood alone, a paragon of biting nostalgia for halcyon days. Then, the networks wanted a piece of the pie and devised a pair of copycats, see ABC’s Pan Am and NBC’s The Playboy Club. Each show, Mad Men included, hopes to lovingly recreate the past while offering a sly critique of the time and its people, but none seem daring enough to make viewers remember just how bad the 60’s were for anyone who wasn’t a white male. Now, an adaptation of Kathryn Sockett’s New York Time’s Best Seller The Help has come along to show just how blinding the glaze of nostalgia for the 1960s really is.

The Help is a fairly meta tale of three women living in Jackson, Mississippi in the early 1960s—Aibileen (an amazing, as always, Viola Davis), Minny (Octavia Spencer, showing sublime wit and range), and Eugenia “Skeeter” Phelan (a typically spunky Emma Stone)—whose lives intersect when Skeeter starts to work on “The Help”, a non-fiction novel recounting the experiences of African-American maids who work in white households. Skeeter gets the idea for her novel after returning to Jackson in the wake of her graduation from Ole’ Miss. She meets Aibileen—a quiet and dignified maid who just lost her only son, but has raised a gaggle of children better than their parents and is currently the caretaker of chubby toddler, Mae Mobley Leefolt—at a bridge party organized by contemptuous bigot Hilly Holbrook (a particularly evil Bryce Dallas-Howard) and, being the educated scion of a relatively progressive white family, is inspired to document Aibileen’s story. After conquering an early, rational reluctance due to a understandable fear of retaliation, Aibileen provides Skeeter with a collection of heartwrenching stories that tell of the suffering many African-Americans faced silently, but Aibileen’s stories are not enough. Aibileen drafts her closest friend, the strong-willed and cleverly witty Minny Jackson, to provide more stories. In time, and in response to growing tensions flamed by several key moments in the Civil Rights movement, Skeeter is collecting the tales of most of the town's overworked and criminally mistreated domestic labor force. While the three continue to clandestinely compose Skeeter’s tome in hopes of publication, each will find their lives significantly changed by the experience.

Three major arcs compete for attention in The Help, but only two are strong enough to really leave an impression. Unsurprisingly, Aibileen and Minny’s arcs are the strongest, anchored by superb performances and motivated by true dramatic stakes. While Emma Stone delivers one of her trademark performances as the obviously-to-smart-for-this-backwater-town Skeeter, her arc is far weaker than Aibileen’s and Minny’s because it tries to do too much with too little time. Skeeter’s arc tries to address the emergence of white guilt and the place of women in the workplace all while attempting to build a scant romantic subplot. Not only are Aibileen and Miny’s arcs blessed with the exemplary work of Viola Davis and Octavia Spencer, they boast a simplicity and a fascinating insight into how these women dealt with the struggle of their circumstance. The thread that ties the three stories together, aside from the book, is Bryce Dallas-Howard’s Hilly Holbrook. Today, one of the easiest ways to build an effective villain is to make the that villian a racist. Hilly is a spectacularly devilish bigot. A selfish social climber who had her own mother, Sissy Spacek in a wonderfully irreverent turn, She seems to hate everybody, or at least believes she’s better than everybody in Jackson, but maids like Minny and Aibileen get the lion’s share of her wrath. Since the heart of the conflict in The Help is between Hilly and Aibileen and Minny, Stone’s Skeeter and her story seems ancillary with some of the very same concepts that are succinctly measured in Aibileen’s arc being retread in Skeeter’s. The Help will certainly win cheers and tears by its end, but any those emotional acclaims will come in response tothe fine work of Davis, Spencer and Dallas-Howard and the poignant simplicity of their conflict and growth.

Despite packing The Help with one arc too many—which, I know, can’t be helped, as Skeeter’s arc is crucial to the original novel—Director Tate Taylor adequately paints a picture of the American South in the 60’s that is never too pristine or ugly. There’s a welcome balance to the visual palette that brings the antebellum and the modern, for the time, into perfect contrast, from the lush views of Skeeter’s family’s plantation to the on point recreations of big fin Cadillacs and all-night diners. Apart from the visuals, Taylor shows a solid hand at developing characters without melodrama. Early scenes of Aibileen’s life are understated and moving combinations of visual and narration that tell a better story than dialogue ever could. Taylor also adds a healthy dose of humor to a potentially depressing story through characters like Spencer’s delightfully straightforward Minny and Spacek’s slightly loopy Missus Walter, but he never lets the humor overwhelm the gravity of the tale and it never comes at the expense of making the characters less than human. Because The Help is so jam-packed with character arcs for not only the main three, but a fair number of the supporting cast as well, Taylor has to employ a great deal of visual shorthand to give attention to the plethora of stories. While a few characters are notably underserved in the development department (e.g. Hilly), most of the character arcs are well attended by Taylor’s command of simple visuals and judicious editing that leaves some of the more unnerving sights to the audience’s imagination.

The Help succeeds despite being a bit overstuffed and trying to serve too many stories. It is sure to trend well with the built-in audience that has already read the book. As I have not read the book, I can’t accurately comment on the faithfulness of this adaptation, but if the book shares the spirit of this film then I probably need to get to a bookstore, or at least Amazon, fairly soon. While The Help is clearly aimed at its faithful, it does not alienate the uninitiated, offering a tale that many have heard details about, but never witnessed from such an intimate perspective. Sure, it’s nothing explicitly new—especially if you grew up in a household where your great-grandparents could tell stories like Minny and Aibileen’s from a personal perspective—but The Help is necessary as an affecting reminder that the old days weren’t particularly good to everybody.

Review - 50/50

Grade: A

Good: Amazing performance from Joseph Gordon-Levitt is at the heart of this respectful take on a young man struggling with cancer. Seth Rogen’s raunchy comedy is actually a relief. Great supporting work from Anna Kendrick and Anjelica Huston; Tearjerker that earns tears by avoiding emotional manipulation.

Bad: Hits a few rote plot points with Bryce Dallas-Howard’s character and offers a predictable relationship subplot; Rogen does his typical schtick, so mileage may vary.

Ugly: Surgery sucks.

In my review of 30 Minutes or Less, I mentioned how the popularity of R-rated comedies has led to the use of comedy to examine other genres. I also made note that the popularity of R-rated comedies today is due in large part to the success of movies like The Hangover and Judd Apatow’s oeuvre. It’s been a while since audiences have had a Apatow-directed project hit the screen, the latest being 2009’s Funny People. Despite the current absence of an Apatow-directed project, his influence is still fairly ubiquitous in the realm of R-rated comedies. Apatow’s style of combining subtle raunch with pure heart has left an indelible mark on writers and directors of contemporary grown-up comedies, forcing many to consider their characters as human beings rather punch lines or stereotypes and to craft stories based around realistic issues such as unplanned pregnancy and terminal illness. As is par for the course in Hollywood, studios have tried to ape this format to mostly diminishing returns, but Summit’s upcoming 50/50 is probably the closest any studio has ever come to capturing Apatow’s magic touch.

Directed by The Wackness’ Jonathan Levine, 50/50 stars Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Adam Lerner, seemingly the nicest 27-year old in the world. Adam enjoys a decent existence as a public radio producer in Seattle, where he works with his slightly dickish best friend Kyle (Seth Rogen). He lives with girlfriend, flighty artist Racheal (Bryce Dallas-Howard) and dodges calls from his smothering mother Diane (Anjelica Huston). All seems well for Adam until a routine trip to doctor reveals that a pain in Adam’s back is actually a malignant tumor. Adam is diagnosed—by a doctor so bereft of bedside manner that one has to wonder how he made it past his residency—with a rare form of cancer, Schwanomma, that is marked by a 50% survival rate. From there, the film follows Adam’s attempts to deal with the diagnosis and chemotherapy on the path to an extremely risky surgery. Along the way, Adam tries to cope with a seeming death sentence with the help of his friend, family and an inexperienced, yet optimistic therapist (Anna Kendrick).

From that description, 50/50—based largely on the experiences of screenwriter Will Reiser—sounds like straight-up Oscar bait, designed to mercilessly manipulate audiences into watching it with tense smiles and tear-stained eyes. In truth, this movie will really make audiences laugh, cry and cheer. What makes 50/50 different from a Lifetime movie of the week is that it earns those laughs, tears and cheers through an honesty and subtlety that it could have easily avoided for schmaltz, melodrama and tasteless gags. 50/50 succeeds mostly due to Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s amazingly understated performance. Most actors would look at a film like 50/50 as an opportunity to devour scenery with overwrought emotion, but Gordon-Levitt wisely avoids this path, opting to play Adam as shell-shocked and generally taciturn. Many cancer sufferers like Adam struggle with phenomenal loneliness despite the presence of family and friends, and Gordon-Levitt superbly captures the quiet loneliness that is as deadly as the cancer. His restraint throughout the majority of 50/50 leads to the usual moments of breakdown near the film’s climax that are truly heart-wrenching. What makes these moments so potent is the fact that Gordon-Levitt earns them. They don’t come out of the blue or after a series of histrionics. These moments are the result of suffering in silence and isolation, and they are far closer to reality than any overblown emotion that a lesser actor might supply.

While Gordon-Levitt’s performance is the unequivocal highlight of 50/50, the work of Rogen, Kendrick and Huston is also quite splendid. Seth Rogen brings his trademark exuberant snark and bawdiness to 50/50, which counteracts what could be a significantly melancholy proceeding. Rogen isn’t stepping to far outside his comfort zone with his performance, often delivering the same type of dick and sex jokes with alternating smarm and mania, but in 50/50 it serves a greater purpose. The audience needs Rogen’s type of energy as relief, but Adam needs it to survive, and for that reason Rogen’s typical humor becomes far less grating than it normally is. Like Rogen, Anna Kendrick brings her familiar perkiness and subtle anxiousness to bear as Adam’s therapist, Katie. Kendrick plays Katie with a balance of nervousness and earnestness that is appropriate for the character’s therapist-in-training status and uses the doctor-patient barrier to restrain a growing attraction to Adam. While it’s pretty clear where Katie and Adam will end up, Kendrick gives Katie an air of reluctance that is sensible, yet obviously challenging as she is well acquainted with the consequence of Adam’s condition. That sense of realism is what grounds Kendrick’s performance, and most of 50/50, in the notion that a happy ending isn’t all that likely.

On the other side of Adam’s support system is his mother Diane, played with disturbing accuracy by Anjelica Huston. Huston role is smaller than Rogen and Kendrick’s, despite her playing the typical cornerstone of support, but it is significant in how well it reveals the motherly response to dying child. The old adage of “a parent shouldn’t have to bury their child” is clearly at the heart of Huston’s performance. When she delivers moments of pure elation sadness, or fear, all of which her son coldly rebuffs, she becomes the mother that, hopefully, most members of the audience can identify with. Rarely have I seen a concerned parent rendered so pitch perfectly on screen and Huston deserves a true tip of the hat for the honesty in her performance. The only main performance that fails to connect is Bryce Dallas-Howard’s role as Adam’s girlfriend, Rachael. Sadly, it’s a thankless role as the girl who might not have what it takes to support a dying man. With some more shading and depth, it could have been something remarkable, but alas it is the stereotypical character who is villainized without reasonable examination.

The misstep with Dallas-Howard’s Rachael is one of only a few that Director Jonathan Levine makes with 50/50. Generally, he offers a respectful honest and occasionally lighthearted look at Adam’s struggle cancer without ever resorting to melodrama. He intelligently applies a low-fi approach to 50/50, letting the actors do the work without beating the audience over the head with flashing signs that say “CRY HERE!” He employs a fairly dim visual style that allows the film to mimic the dreariness of Seattle while highlighting the Adam’s isolation. In addition, he reigns in theatrical displays of emotion among the cast to open the door for more honest responses to the grave situation, which shows a much-needed level of respect rather than milking cancer for melancholy. Even when focusing on the more challenging aspects of the treatment and coping processes, Levine never overdoes it, showing something once and letting it stand instead of repeatedly dragging the audience into Adam’s personal hell. Levine does so well with most aspects of the film that when he does falter it’s painfully obvious. Aside from the issues with Dallas-Howard’s character, the burgeoning relationship between Adam and Katie can be pretty predictable and Rogen’s schtick is a bit too similar to his other roles. However, these are minor issues in light of the myriad triumphs that dominate 50/50.

Fair warning for those who are prone to easy tears, 50/50 will make you bawl by the end, but it never feels like a cheap manipulation. This is an honest film that deals with cancer respectfully and uses the light touch and raunchy comedy to provide relief and perspective, never mockery. With some amazing performances and tight direction, this is definitely prime Oscar bait and a true descendent of the Apatow legacy, and it is the rare film that actually deserves to both claims.