Karen,

Might I ask a question of clarification? Are you asking because you are personally curious or because the responses will be used in some way? I think this is an important point of clarity, but I'll respond in either case. 

What is most disturbing about films such as "The Help," which I plan to see as a rental in an attempt to try to understand its cultural appeal and the ways it speaks to contemporary views of race, is that films such as this do well at the box office. Because I haven't seen it yet, I will not comment on the film itself but rather on the political economics of films that have if not a White saviour trope, a White lens through which to view the African American experience in an imagined past. That this trope is repeated suggests that this is a formula for at least domestic success - the reasons for which are less clear. Is it simply because the majority of the audience is White and go to this movie in large enough numbers to justify production costs? Or, is it because producers know that narratives like this one are well-received by awards committees that act as promotional vehicles (e.g., "Driving Miss Daisy"). Or, do people of color, specifically African American viewers watch films like this because of the pleasure of representation, even if that representation is horrid. Or, is it because White stars use the power of their commercial viability to promote production of films such as this to strengthen their own careers? I don't know the answers to these questions in this case, but if there is ever to be satisfactory resolution and stories of the African American experience shared through African American eyes, it will have to address the political economics of the movies' production. 

The cultural impact of the representations is additionally troubling. The most obvious, which was discussed in the reviews, is that it implies that African American lives and experiences are only legitimated when understood through a White perspective. It approaches diversity on the easiest, least challenging terms possible. It is a diversity that avoids being de-centered with Whiteness as its central hub. The next is the ways it creates a dystopian, racist past that suggests a post-racial moment - post-racial in the popular cultural sense that racism is now confined to the margins of individual bigots' minds. To see the types of systemic racism that existed implies that these forms of systemic racism no longer do, that this was the pivot upon which transformation happened. Third, it inserts Whites into the heroic narrative of civil rights. As Kristen Hoerl writes in her article on "Mississippi Burning," these narratives create a historically inaccurate popular memory in which Whites were doing their part to combat racism at its most nascent stages, that Whites were central to the battle for Civil Rights. Though it is equally untrue to diminish Whites' roles in anti-racist movement and history, it is problematic to create a revisionist form of popular memory in which Whites were central heroes in our popular culture. This would not be repugnant on its face if it included more narratives of African American heroism, not to mention links with other anti-racist movements (more in terms of number, influence, and quality). Finally, if I understand this film like many of its ilk, it presents racism neoliberally as an individual-level phenomenon, that correction of racism is to change enough people's individual attitudes rather than to make systemic change, to make life chances more equal, to narrow the gap of privilege and oppression, etc. 

I hope my thoughts here were useful in some way. 

Best,
David

On Thu, Oct 13, 2011 at 1:13 PM, Karen Bond <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
Dear MAC members,
A movie written by a man about the pain experienced during childbirth would get little attention because obviously there are women who could write more credible accounts.  So why do we always pay so much attention to books written by whites about the pain of the black experience in America?  For me, a movie written by a white woman about the pain of the black experience has no value.  In fact, the ability for so many whites to get rich off of this literary formula insults and belittles my experience as a black woman. 

The signature on my email messages has always read:
"Until the lion has his own historian, the tail of the hunt will always glorify the hunter."

And so it goes.  "The Help" once again glorifies white woman as the savior of black women.

When "The Help" came out, I sent out the message below to some of my associates seeking their opinions on the movie.  Now I'm asking MAC members what they think about the issues raised in the message below:

------------ Forwarded message ------------
From: K J Bond <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Aug 16, 2011
Subject: FYI, I've decided NOT to see “The Help”. . .

FYI,

I've decided NOT to see “The Help”.

I saw “Driving Miss Daisy”, “Crash”, and “Avatar”. On one level, I enjoyed some of these movies. But by the the time “The Blind Side” came out, I had a decision to make: Could I sit through one more film that perpetuated the falsehoods of “the white savior myth”?  I decided I couldn't and so I did not see “The Blindside”.  And I will not see “The Help”.  I do not want to risk the chance that my financial contribution to its box office receipts might encourage Hollywood to continue plying the nation's consciousness with this misinformation.

In addition to “the white savior myth”, the negative image of Black men in this movie is also a problem for me.  As far as many of us know and have experienced in this life, Black men are awesome.  However, this fact is rarely represented in film.  Once too often I've seen the reinforcement of an insulting and false Black male stereotype used as a handy plot device.  This is one more reason why I will not be seeing “The Help”.

One might say that I should not pass judgment on a film I have not seen, but this is no different than my decision not to see the “Texas Chainsaw Massacre”. I read about the “Texas Chainsaw Massacre” movie and concluded I don't actually have to pay money to see people's limbs being severed in order to decide this movie is not for me.  Based on having seen other horror movies of its type, I knew that I literally could not stomach seeing it.  And likewise, after researching “The Help” I believe the movie is most definitely not for me.

The owner of FOX television, arch-conservative Rupert Murdoch, also owns The Wall Street Journal.  Here's what The Wall Street Journal said about “The Help”:
“ 'The Help' is bound to be a hit. Just as readers loved the book, for good reason—its resonant themes transcended its imperfect craftsmanship—audiences starved for substance after a long, dry summer will embrace the movie. They'll do so not only for the white guilt it addresses, and deftly mitigates, but for the plot's entertaining contrivances (chief among them a climax of cyclonic uplift), the bonds of love between whites and blacks and a cast of outsize characters...”

So Rupert Murdoch's movie reviewers think one important reason people will love and “embrace” “The Help” is for how it “deftly mitigates” white guilt (mitigates, as in “to reduce”, “to lessen”, “to decrease”). Hmmmm... interesting that THIS is a theme (purpose?) that resonates throughout the movie for them.

Below, I have copied some interesting opinions that helped me make up my mind about the nature of this movie. I invite you to copy this email message to all you feel might benefit from it.  Please participate in my informal survey - drop me a line to let me know whether you intend to contribute to The Help's box office receipts and why.

Thanks!
~ Karen 



=============================================================================
=============================================================================

HOW RACIST IS “THE HELP”?
Anthony Kaufman's ReelPolitik Blog

“Why should I complain about making $7,000 a week playing a maid? If I didn’t, I’d be making $7 a week being one.”—Hattie McDaniel

Despite Hollywood’s best intentions and well-meaning saccharine storytelling, it gets race wrong, repeatedly. From “Driving Miss Daisy” to “Crash” to “The Blind Side” to “Avatar,” whiteness remains Hollywood’s dominant force, and its stories of racial redemption continually fail to grapple with the realities of America’s horrible racism, past and present.

For all those giving a pass to “The Help,” forgiving the film’s reactionary core for its strong performances or heartwarming uplift, I suggest you consider the deep-seated problem of perpetuating the white savior myth—once again. It reinforces stereotypes, powerful images of subjugation, that endure in the public consciousness.

I like what Boston Globe critic Wesley Morris wrote in his review of the film:
“The best film roles three black women will have all year require one of them to clean Ron Howard’s daughter’s house. It’s self-reinforcing movie imagery. White boys have always been Captain America. Black women, in one way or another, have always been someone’s maid. These are strong figures, as that restaurant owner might sincerely say, but couldn’t they be strong doing something else? That’s the hardest thing to reconcile about Skeeter’s book and ‘The Help’’ in general. On one hand, it’s juicy, heartwarming, well-meant entertainment. On the other, it’s an owner’s manual.”

In a post called “Why Can’t Critics Just Get Along,” David Poland criticizes critics for criticizing the fact that “The Help” was made, at all, and not reviewing the film on its relative faults and merits. But Poland doesn’t seem to read Morris’s point—and mine, as well—that the film’s faults are integrally mixed with its premise. To make a film that purports to be about the struggles of black servitude that is actually just another tale about a white person’s empowerment is grossly irresponsible, from a political perspective, and kind of lame, from a narrative perspective.

In his 1965 essay, “White Man’s Guilt,” James Baldwin writes about America’s racism: “One wishes that Americans, white Americans, would read, for their own sakes, this record, and stop defending themselves against it. Only then will they be enabled to change their lives. The fact that Americans, white Americans, have not yet been able to do this - to face their history, to change their lives - hideously menaces this country. Indeed, it menaces the entire world.”
Forty-six years later, it seems, the American white establishment still can’t seem to understand that they are responsible for racial discrimination and subjugation, and not, as “The Help” would have it, responsible for breaking down those walls.

I also can’t help wonder what does it say about “The Help” that Ablene Cooper, an African American nanny and housekeeper who works for “The Help” author Kathryn Stockett’s brother and sister-in-law, filed a lawsuit against Stockett, claiming that the central African American maid in the novel — a woman named Aibileen Clark and portrayed in the film by Viola Davis — was based largely on her likeness without her approval. A judge will decide on the case next week, as millions of Americans will fork over cash, enriching more white Americans. The exploitation continues.

=============================================================================
=============================================================================

THE HELP: Boston Globe Movie Review
by Wesley Morris

...Skeeter’s exposé is meant to empower both the subjects and the author, but “The Help’’ joins everything from “To Kill a Mockingbird’’ to “The Blind Side’’ as another Hollywood movie that sees racial progress as the province of white do-gooderism. Skeeter [a white woman] enjoys all the self-discovery and all the credit... The novel made a lot of people feel good. It was sneaky. Stockett wrote tolerably in Aibileen and Minny’s voices - in a way that keeps black vernacular inside dignified English, and avoids the literary dehumanization that Toni Morrison has written about. But as much as the book was about race and class, it was really about how feminism empowered Skeeter, and Stockett, to address other injustices... Tate Taylor, a childhood friend of Stockett, adapted and directed the movie. He applies a thick coat of gloss to most scenes. It’s hard not to imagine what trouble the passive, largely absent husbands of these bigoted women are up to off-screen. The death of the civil rights activist Medgar Evers is reported on television, so white supremacy is in the air, but the movie would have us believe that the racism of the time was the stuff of bridge clubs. Indeed, the meanest male in the movie is the abusive, mostly unseen black husband who, in a poorly made sequence, comes after Minny... “The Help’’ comes out on the losing end of the movies’ social history.

=============================================================================
=============================================================================

RACIST OR RAVING: WHAT CRITICS ARE SAYING ABOUT “THE HELP”

by Jessica Wakeman

...Some critics, both armchair and professional, say the new flick starring Emma Stone, Viola Davis, Octavia Spencer, Bryce Dallas Howard, and Allison Janney is a white-washed, even racist version of the civil rights movement that praises a white woman as the savior of the poor black folks. (Cough “The Blind Side” cough.) They ask why Hollywood makes films about civil rights through the lens of white people, instead of giving due credit to the African-Americans who fought for their rights. And that is certainly a worthy question to ask.
Others (me, for instance) read and loved the book and are excited to see the movie, imperfect as the narrative may be. (Though I agree it would be better for Hollywood to make more films that tell a less white-centric narrative.)...

...Whether you decide to see the movie or not, or to read Kathryn Stockett’s novel or not, is up to you. To help give you an idea of some of the controversy surrounding “The Help” I’ve rounded up the criticism from all angles:
From Akiba Solomon at Colorlines:
“As a racial justice and gender writer, a pop culture observer, and an African American woman who rides for Viola Davis, Octavia Spencer, Cicely Tyson and Aunjanue Ellis, I feel obligated to see this film. But, damn it, I’m jaded, and it has absolutely nothing to do with watching black women portray domestic workers onscreen. (There’s no shame in domestic work, unless you’re talking about their employers’ abuse and wage exploitation.) I just can’t bring myself to pay $12.50 after taxes and fees to sit in an aggressively air conditioned, possibly bed bug-infested, New York City movie theater to watch these sisters lend gravitas to Stockett’s white heroine mythology. I’m sorry, but the trailer alone features way too many group hugs to be trusted.”
From Martha Southgate at Entertainment Weekly:
“Implicit in The Help and a number of other popular works that deal with the civil rights era is the notion that a white character is somehow crucial or even necessary to tell this particular tale of black liberation. ... This isn’t the first time the civil rights movement has been framed this way fictionally, especially on film. ... Why is it ever thus? Suffice it to say that these stories are more likely to get the green light and to have more popular appeal (and often acclaim) if they have white characters up front. That’s a shame.”
From Ann Hornaday at The Washington Post:
“One of those truths, which “The Help” deserves praise for bringing to light, is that racism should be understood less as a matter of black grievance than of unexamined white privilege and pathology. ... [Racist character] Hilly’s monstrousness is in keeping with “The Help’s” tendency to reduce its characters to stock types, but it has the effect of enabling white viewers to distance themselves from racism’s subtler, more potent expressions.”
Tami at What Tami Said:
“This is my worry: That even if “The Help” film gets it right, viewers will see just another movie about a spunky, young, white girl, setting the world on fire, while the lives, stories and agency of black women remain invisible.”
And last but not least, what I thought was the strongest review of “The Help”: Wesley Morris at The Boston Globe:
“The movie is too pious for farce and too eager to please to comment persuasively on the racial horrors of the Deep South at that time. ... The death of the civil rights activist Medgar Evers is reported on television, so white supremacy is in the air, but the movie would have us believe that the racism of the time was the stuff of bridge clubs. Indeed, the meanest male in the movie is the abusive, mostly unseen black husband who, in a poorly made sequence, comes after Minny. ... “The Help’’ comes out on the losing end of the movies’ social history. The best film roles three black women will have all year require one of them to clean Ron Howard’s daughter’s house. It’s self-reinforcing movie imagery. White boys have always been Captain America. Black women, in one way or another, have always been someone’s maid. These are strong figures, as that restaurant owner might sincerely say, but couldn’t they be strong doing something else? That’s the hardest thing to reconcile about Skeeter’s book and “The Help’’ in general.”

=============================================================================
=============================================================================

IS VIOLA DAVIS' CHARACTER IN THE HELP JUST THE STEREOTYPICAL BLACK MAMMY?

I cannot contain my anger and disappointment that Viola Davis decided to star in the new film The Help. Hollywood produces very myopic representations of black women. Black women are either whores like Halle Berry in Monster’s Ball or maids like Viola Davis in The Help. The social construction of the binary of black female sexuality is very limited. The film roles available for black women tend to be two dimensional and not nuanced. Black women in North America are still presented as inferior to white women. The white woman is still placed on the pedestal as the true image of womanhood.

...Of course, the white woman saves the day since the purpose of The Help is to promote the narrative that as black people we cannot save ourselves... The genesis of The Help is that in order for white people to be interested in movies about black people, a white person must always be the protagonist.
The Help is just another form of the classic white saviour movies. Usually in a white saviour movie, the white protagonist has an epiphany and decides to help the black people that are constructed as victims. I am so tired of the racist white saviour narrative that black people need to be saved by whites.

Another problem I have with The Help is the film promotes the racist narrative that black women have no agency. The only purpose black people have in the film is to serve white folks. Black womanhood is constructed as just to be loving and nurturing. The Help does not present Viola Davis or Octavia Spencer’s characters as three dimensional women. Hollywood consistently promotes the discourse that a black woman’s purpose in life is to exist in an anterior time. I cringed when I heard the line in the trailer “we love them and they love us.”

Yes, black women loved working in the domestic sphere and served rich white women. Of course, The Help ignores the fact that in America, black women were blocked from higher educational opportunities for decades... The majority of black women had to work in domestic work because that’s the only form of work they were offered!

Two years ago, Sandra Bullock's racist film The Blind Side, also promoted this abhorrent narrative disavowing black agency. The Blind Side made over $200 million dollars at the North American box office. Hollywood will continue to make racist movies such as The Help because the public supports this bigotry. Would the general public really want to see an honest movie about black female domestics that were raped by white men?

...The trailer for The Help is so racist and sexist against black women. I just feel sick watching this racist garbage! It is so sad that the best role Viola Davis can get since her Academy Award nomination for Doubt is just being the black mammy! ...The Help engenders the discourse that a black woman's purpose is to be subservient to white folks. I also find the racist narrative of the white saviour in The Help problematic. In the 1960s civil rights movement, my black elders helped themselves - they did not sit and wait for white folks to gain freedom!
===================
ONLINE COMMENTS:
===================
"I want to read the African-American version of The Help.”
===================
Erin Aubry Kaplan wonders "Why must blacks speak dialect to be authentic? Why are Stockett's white characters free of the linguistic quirks that white Southerners certainly have?" The Christian Science Monitor notes the same problem, wondering about the "decision to convey only black voices in dialect, with nary a dropped 'g' among her generally less sympathetic Southern white characters."
===================
“Many have taken issue with the core theme of the movie – a young white girl helping to ‘empower’ black women in the South. And then there’s anger that strong black actresses like Viola Davis are ‘reduced’ to playing maids in 2011.”
===================
“I did check the book out at local public library about 2 weeks ago. But after reading the inside jacket I got on the computer to find out who the author was. After finding out the author was a Caucasian and, based on the topic, I returned book to the library without even reading a page. Why? I personally felt that if this writer wanted to write a book about her personal life experience as a young woman growing up in Mississippi in the 60's, she should have told the story from her own personal perspective. To try and tell the story from her maid's perspective I felt would be superficial.”
==================
“My concern is over the specific types of stories about race that get such critical, mainstream acclaim. Stories like Precious, the Blind Side, etc. suggest that there is a very specific set of requirements for a movie dealing with race, and anything outside of that mold isn’t going to get that level of attention.
...I haven’t seen the movie yet, but I do worry (and have seen support for this worry in the reviews I’ve read) that this script was chosen for its ability to be boiled down into the preferred narrative about race, one that too often simplifies a complex issue and leaves white people feeling all warm and fuzzy about their enlightened perspective.”
==================

============================================================================

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Karen J. Bond
Executive Director
National Black Coalition for Media Justice (NBCMJ)
Phone: (847) 328-4849  Cell: (224) 616-1119
Email Address: [log in to unmask]
Website (currently under construction): www.nbcmj.org
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@

UNTIL THE LION HAS HIS OWN HISTORIAN, THE TALE OF THE HUNT WILL ALWAYS GLORIFY THE HUNTER.

-African Proverb
@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@