March is Women's History Month and I figured I'd follow Black History Month with a movie that would have fit in either month. I've heard so many good things said about this movie, predominately how much it effected the viewer. The acting is also renowned, but with a cast like the one it has, that's no wonder. There are some heavy hitters in this film that tend to leave us with incredibly memorable performances. The story follows women in the 60s working as maids, but I'm not exactly sure what kinds of women they are serving. I'm sure there's a lot of moments that show the blatant and implicit racism that existed in the 60s. Women in the 60s dealt with a lot of sexism in general, so it's important to remember what it was like so we don't allow it to fall back to that level of sexism again. There's a lot of idealization of any historical era, but it's too easy to forget what was bad about it, too. For women of color in that era, they would have dealt with a double whammy of prejudice making their lives even harder. This movie never got watched by me because it was so hyped up and I have a tendency to avoid some movies when they reach a certain level of hype and this one hit that mark. I guess it's time to finally watch it and see what all the hype was about.
This is an interesting movie. It shows some ugly things about our history and the type of mentality that existed in the South in the early 60s. I've heard a lot of things about the movie being a white-washed version of the reality of that time and era. That it was a story of black life told from the perspective of a white woman, so how could it truly understand the real adversity that black women faced in that era. I can understand the criticism because it is hard to tell a story that you haven't lived, but even a glimpse from the outside in at least gives some more awareness to an audience that might not have known the situation beforehand. It was an entertaining story and even just this small glimpse gives me a better idea the types of hardships some of these women would have had to face.
It amazes me that it was so common to have a house maid come to your home daily to take care of your home and family for you. If you had someone else cleaning your house and raising your children, what did the housewife do all day? The film shows them playing cards and having lunch together, just socializing. It blows my mind. I can't imagine someone else raising my child to that degree. The one mother never even changed her own child's diaper in the middle of the night. It's awful to think that a child would have to stay eight to ten hours in a dirty diaper like that. Aibileen even says that this particular woman should not be having a second child and is adamant that this fact makes it into the book. It is a mindset that baffles me, but apparently it was quite common in some of the elite housewives. I guess the logic is, if they can afford to pay someone to do those undesirable tasks, why bother doing them themselves at all? I can completely understand having someone else come in and clean my own house to save me the hassle of it, but I'm thinking of once or twice a month, not daily. Having others do too much for you only encourages you to be lazy and we sometimes need to do things for ourselves. It's good for the psyche to accomplish a task, no matter how trivial it may seem and they feel far more rewarding than we would expect them to. Even just a fresh set of sheets on your bed or a quick vacuuming of your bedroom floor can change how you feel when you go to bed at night. Such a small task that takes no time, but you feel accomplished and are rewarded for your effort. I don't know if we can truly appreciate something if we haven't accomplished it ourselves. Then this is the behavior that gets passed down to their children. They don't learn how to be self sufficient. They learn to rely on others to do simple tasks and that seems wrong to me, but that's growing up in the household of a single mother who had a "do it yourself" mentality.
I loved that when Minny became "the help" for Celia Foote, she started teaching her how to cook these meals. It was like passing a family tradition down to a new family member. Minny was the perfect compliment to Celia's flitting personality. She grounded her employer in a way that Celia needed most. She didn't need a quiet, obedient servant. She needed a friend and a guide into her new role as housewife. Minny's strong willed nature was a much needed breath of fresh air in the world of stuck up women of this film. I understand they were a product of their society and it was the way women were expected to act, but man am I glad those days are past! I can't imagine having to walk all the tightropes those women had to navigate. It would have driven me mad and I would have found my own way to fight back against it. I know there is this sort of idealism about that era, but all I have to do is think of those types of situations and I will be glad every time that I was born in the 80s to see things changing for the better over the past 30 years. It may be a slow climb, but I know I have been given many more opportunities to make my life what I want it to be than I would have had in the 50s or 60s. In some ways, I've lived a charmed life compared to those struggles. It may not always be kittens and rainbows, but the good always outweighs the bad for me and I will never take that for granted.
I love the comradery that these women have built up with each other. They have their own support group to go to whenever things get difficult. Aibileen and Minny especially have a strong bond. They spend time with each other and with Minny's family (since Aibileen is the last survivor in her family) through good times and bad and all of the major events of the time. They are true friends and not just friends out of convenience. They were friends with the other women who lived in their neighborhood and worked in the same field, but the two of them connected on a whole other level. Those types of friendships are what gets you through difficult times when things could have been more bleak or downtrodden. You get through them feeling like they weren't as bad because you had something positive to ground you and keep you trudging through it. Aside from Minny and Aibileen being the main friends, Celia and Skeeter also gained friendships with these women, though it wasn't the same kind of friendship, it was a bridge between the divide of the races in that time and it was an important step in general to ending segregation.
No, I'm not saying that the book that was written or the bonds between these women are what sparked a movement, but it was that particular action that needed to be repeated by many others. To have those in power see that those being oppressed were actually being repressed in so many more ways than they even realized and to want to make things better for them. To reach across the divide and see that they were just people trying to live their lives in happiness. All the little moments in time where one single person changed their mind and felt that things could not go on the way they had been. That's what drove the movement. A single mind at a time building into a force that could not be ignored. The book brought out an ugly truth that had to be faced before it could be mended. It made the people reading the book look inwardly at themselves and see that maybe they weren't living the perfect façade that they showed the world. But before the book could even be written, it took one person standing up to say that their story was worth telling, even with dire consequences. That one strong woman inspired another. Then the whole group decided it was high time that their story was told, as well.
I haven't had a chance yet to say how much I loved Sissy Spacek in this movie! She is from an old world and her use of racial slurs isn't something she thinks is hurtful because she wasn't taught that there are better ways to address someone. Doesn't change the fact that it does hurt them, though. It was when Minny sabotaged a chocolate pie for Hilly, though, that I really loved her performance. The sheer joy she portrayed was wonderful. Even when she can't remember her name, what year it is or where she is, she still remembers that pie and the look of outrage on her daughter's face after she realizes what was in it. When she buys Hilly that same pie at the auction, it was her own way of humbling Hilly. Since Hilly stuck her in a home instead of taking care of her herself, she felt the need to take a jab back at the daughter who, in her eyes, was ungrateful and skirting her duties to care for her in her old age and sickness. Her laughter and smile just lit up the screen in those moments and I loved it.
All in all I feel like this was a worthwhile film to watch. It could have been done differently now, but in the time the movie was released, we were still transitioning to more honest portrayals of those times, so it wasn't as bad as what I'd read in reviews. It's not the kind of movie that is for everyone, but it is a fun flick to watch when you're looking for a little humor with a side of loosely woven history. Stay tuned for my next Women's History movie, Cleopatra!
For more movie love, check out my other blog, "You're Watching That Again?!"
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