Hollywood seems ready to talk about unfortunate parts of its history, though America doesn't have sole blame for past injustices that still haunt and carry on today it does have the most powerful form of artistic communication, in cinema. A communicative tool so far unused in telling accurate stories of a shameful past, remaining brushed under the carpet in a bid to keep the "land of the free" pristine and upstanding. Along with Tarantino's slavery western and Steve McQueen's Twelve Years A Slave due next year, The Help is front of line in a new flurry of films tackling difficult and neglected subject matter for the first time in such a commercial field.
Adapted from Kathryn Stockett's novel of the same name, The Help follows 23 year old journalist Skeeter Phelan (Emma Stone) as she embarks on a risky perhaps life threatening project. Skeeter operates as the film's moral compass, as she sees awful treatment of 'coloured help' in well-to-do white households she feels uneasy and alienated, as do we. She wants to write a book from the view point of the help, to give them a voice and to reveal the harsh realities of their daily lives. With two at first cautious volunteers played by the scene stealing Viola Davis, and Octavia Spencer who won the Oscar for her role as the downtrodden but never downplayed Minny, they write their diary. Day by day charting new stories as well as past examples in a bid to reveal truth to the masses while the civil rights movements grow.
The treatment of these black women working for less than minimum wage and doing more for white families than either parent ever would or could is heartbreaking. Writer/director Tate Taylor channels Stockett's novel in presenting a shocking and contradictory world of cruelty and ignorance; these woman who are treated without the faintest ounce of respect are raising the American upper classes, helping them to function but then discarded and looked upon in disgust as if not worthy of being near their children. They are a sad necessity to these people yet viewed as ignoble, fired for the most unjust and demeaning reasons.
Despite being rather heavy handed in its melodrama The Help still sails perfectly fine. It certainly does lead us towards desired emotions but is only distracting as we don't need help feeling for these characters, a cast performing as good as this don't need Thomas Newman's sweeping sentimental piano as a crutch. Newman's music serves a purpose as always but intrudes too often which grows increasingly annoying as a scoreless edit of the film would still deliver the tearjerking moments so desperately wanted. The acting here is mainly stellar, in some rather caricature like villainy from Bryce Dallas Howard amongst others it never falls too dangerously towards a demonic representation of Desperate Housewives. That said, this approach to some characters is well performed on that level providing an element clearly wanted by the filmmakers, fun! Never scared of its subject matter The Help is never scared at having some fun too, mostly at the comeuppance of the more racist players such as Dallas Howard's 'Godless' Hilly.
Jessica Chastain (The Tree Of Life) is adorable and shockingly sexy as the ditzy Celia Foote, a member of the community who can relate to being outcast and mistreated. Her growing relationship with Minny is touching and sweet as she learns how to run a house without her husband knowing of her hiring help. Celia's innocence and fondness of Minny is refreshing after the amount of disrespect shown throughout, treating her with fondness, looking up to her almost like a mother. Emma Stone is as brilliant as we've come to expect from this young talent and Skeeter is a commanding heroine in a film holding many, she's a woman ahead of her time countering her oppressive bigoted culture at every turn. Viola Davis steals the show, despite Octavia Spencer picking up her much deserved Oscar, Davis holds attention and broods an emotional intensity inside, keeping it hidden under layers of maternal calm. She has suffered much in her life and a past trauma eats away at her; unlike the wives she works for she doesn't lash out at others as a response to her pain or hollowness, not that she would if able to but we know her to be a gracious loving woman. Davis' portrayal makes us hurt when she hurts every step of the way, effecting us without forcing us like the film so often tries.
The Help is a powerful watch made perfectly accessible thanks to slight cartoon characterisations and light relief in well timed humour. It often tries hard dragging us to its water but with a story as important and touching as this you wish it had the confidence to know how much we want to drink.
This kooky coming of age tale charting one girls' manipulation of the high school gossip chain, is a mixed bag of results never flatlining due to the alluring charms of its leading lady. It operates on multiple levels; as a postmodern take on the high school movie, a fitting sociological commentary on the Facebook/blogger generation, and depicting the damages of modern celebrity. Thanks to Bert V. Royal's sassy smart script and the charisma of one Emma Stone, Easy A is a successful and engrossing comedy that often verges into satirical territory, bringing to mind Election (1999).
Olive (Stone) is a your typical high school girl, an outsider, never part of the in-crowds and cliques; she knows this all too well and her knowingness hangs over much of the film's declaration. Olive (like those behind the film) understand the rules and regulations of not only high school, but the high school movie genre. There is to a point, a theme of life imitating art and vice versa and so on that runs through the film's core. But despite the nostalgic wishing for the 80s films of John Hughes and Cameron Crowe, there's a modern twist that goes beyond a hankering for the past, this is 2010 and the rules have changed. Olive at first learns out to play them to her advantage but gets more than she bargained for as events spiral out of control.
Olive's rather unlikeable best friend backs her into a corner one day, instead of admitting that she lied about how she spent her weekend she decides to lie again, that she lost her virginity. She's telling her friend what she wants to hear and is almost guided into it by her friend's brash intimidating ways. Olive soon realises that news travels fast and before long the whole school knows of her deflowering, at first embarrassed she soon sees a positive transition in her life. Whereas before she was a ghost walking the corridors, now the whole school knows her name, this tall tale of hers has given her strange recognition.
This new found fame is capitalised by Olive, seeing it as harmless self promotion she spreads more rumours as she gets offers from male peers saying they'll pay her to just say they'd hooked up. All seeming harmless at first but her easy time at the top can't last as her infamy implodes causing damage to her life as well as others around her. At one point favourite teacher Mr. Griffith says, "I don't know what your generation's fascination is with documenting your every thought , I can assure you they're not all diamonds". With social networking it's clear how these rumours travelled so fast, harldy needing much help in the past but with new technology gossip is now rocket fuelled. Olive's short lived fame represents the unhealthy representation of today's celebrity, people desperate for fame at any cost for. Andy Warhol couldn't have been more prophetic when he stated in 1968 that, "In the future everyone will be famous for 15 minutes".
One of Olive's rumours was started out of need for a friend, gay friend Brandon. Sick of being tormented each day for his sexual orientation, he begs Olive to say they slept together and they plan to make it somewhat of an event at a popular house party. His begging of Olive to help create this false persona is a reminder of how restrictive and damaging school can be, suffocating self expression and creating often life long insecurities. Through are current world of Twitter and followers, people like to pretend to an extent in their own celebrity, that people care about what they're thinking, where they're going, and what they even had for lunch. These social tools allow us to project a version of ourself onto the world which doesn't accurately represent us, only how we'd like to be viewed. Brandon's reasoning does a good job in defending exactly why.
Emma Stone is a talent beyond her years, bringing a vibrance and unique quality not found amongst actresses of her age. Her unconventional Hollywood beauty along with her unashamed style of performance makes for a duly refreshing actress, a pleasure to behold for every minute we're granted. Olive is unsure of herself yet strong when she needs to be, she's learning as she goes along, like we all have to at that age. Any poor decisions are forgiven as it eats away at her conscience while struggling to do the right thing, desperate to survive the "hell hole" that is high school.
A fine supporting cast makes for mostly positive effects; Patricia Clarkson and Stanley Tucci are Olive's brilliantly exuberant parents, breathing further life into an already lively film. Although the representation of the school's hypocritical Christian group is unfairly misguided, what's at first playful becomes insistent and immovably unfair. A side story involving Mr. and Mrs. Griffith's marriage is also awkwardly tagged on and feels ultimately forced.
These are just slight qualms in a film that manages confidently and competently to reach its goals, even leaving extra room for further thought. By the end, as Olive gets to live the 80s movie moments she so desperately wanted, we have to wonder whether we got ours too. If Easy A wasn't prepared to give us a feel good blast from the past, it delivers a strong and witty reminder of age old adolescent dilemmas as well as newly formed ones, and that's good enough.
This 'romantic dramedy' (or whatever they call them these days) manages to impress and excel beyond the typical restraints of the studio system. With a star studded cast and a promising script that just about pulls it together by the end, Crazy, Stupid, Love is leaps and bounds ahead of the usual cynical studio offerings, though it makes some uneasy decisions and bites off way more than it can chew.
Steve Carell and Julianne Moore play married couple Cal and Emily; high school sweethearts and married since 17, Cal is distraught upon learning the only woman he's ever loved wants divorce as she confesses her unhappiness and unfaithfulness, all over dessert in a swanky restaurant. He takes the news badly and quickly transforms into a self-loathing morose mess of a man, pestering people in bars and shouting the name of the man who Emily admitted to sleeping with. Cal's unsociable defeatist antics catches the eye of 'ladies man' Jacob (Ryan Gosling) who vows to get Cal spruced up with new clothes, a new outlook on life and above all, himself.
Jacob is a rich and handsome man revelling in the single life; oozing with confidence and overwhelming seductive prowess, he's taken aback when his advances are rejected by young Hannah played by Emma Stone (Easy A). She easily walks away from him despite her friends' badgering, labelling her mad to deny such an opportunity. Hannah doesn't think so, she's happy with her current relationship and thinks she's met Mr. Right, confident in a future together. Again, Hannah's friend disagrees with her outlook, thinking she can do much better.
In typical movie montage fashion Jacob takes Cal shopping for new fashionable attire, offering tips to help boost Cal on the dating circuit as they go along. Jacob's reasons for selflessly helping the hapless sap are as yet unknown, but his mission is to make Emily regret the day she gave up on her marriage, though he also doesn't hesitate telling Cal that he was his own undoing.
The film doesn't hesitate to start proceedings off, with the D word being uttered within a minute of meeting the Weavers we're not granted the usual overview of an apparently functioning marriage before being shocked as it breaks down. This isn't a problem, what is is the hurried nature of the film as we flit between the two narrative threads, Cal and Jacob's master/apprentice scenario, and Hannah's life crisis as she doubts her general happiness and direction. In wasting no time introducing us to the characters and their predicaments, it's just as quick to forget them. Hannah goes awol for a painfully long time, at first being set up as relevant and a lively player in the game, an actress as genuinely enjoyable as Emma Stone is always going to be missed. Though there's a reason for this absence to a point, the inclusion of a small scene or two could still have saved an awkward saggy midsection where the trajectory of the film is unfortunately woeful. At this stage we should be settled in and enjoying the films' mostly well guided array of humour and drama, instead we just worry, worry that it's going to fall flat on its face. The problem is that Crazy, Stupid Love never decides where its interest lies, whether its focal point should be the Weavers' wavering marriage, their son's infatuation with his babysitter, the babysitter's infatuation for Cal. These layers work and add up to make the film's standpoint convincing in the end, yet it struggles to juggle them competently throughout and buckles under the sheer amount it takes on. The real story after all, is the rekindling of affection between Cal and Emily, this is the film's centre and it forgets this too easily. Once again less is more.
With some neat entertaining little twists towards the finale, the film offers more than most of its type and does have a steadfast message that only wavers at times due to over crowding. Marisa Tomei and Kevin Bacon are underused but have fine turns as Cal and Emily's respective flings, with Tomei having particular fun as her deranged recovering alcoholic teacher. It would have been nice to have spent more time with Jacob, his character is brought around nicely in a redeeming arc, adding warmth to the cold womaniser he once was. His reasons for helping Cal could have been heightened for more impact, as his lonely high life and clear parental issues could garner further attention. Despite its misjudgments Crazy, Stupid, Love hangs together quite nicely when all is said and done, with any cinematic cliches being pardoned in its knowing nature, its message of never giving up on something worth fighting for is also sweet and earnest. The comedy mostly works, apart from some descents into American Pie like stabs, due to the filmmakers refusing to hone in on a demographic and desperately trying to please all audiences.
Crazy, Stupid, Love would have been a better film if it made the decision to cling to Cal and Emily more intensely, for what its worth many other Hollywood films could learn from this, more like this would be nice please. Then, and only then, a film of this quality and complexion can be dedicated to any age group instead of vain attempts at pleasing them all at once.
