MOVIE REVIEW - The Help

It's always hold your breath time when a huge book comes to the movies.

Will they mess it up? Will they change the story too much, and is it all that the book is? Well, feel free to exhale because The Help is as good as advertised.

The Help is a remarkable story of fictional women of Jackson, Mississippi in the early 1960's, who hire African-American or "colored" house help. Although this is fiction, it is based in principal of facts of the era. It shows the terrible way they treat these hired women and for no good reason other than hate. The help, cook, clean, and in most cases raise the children of these bigoted people. It's a story that shows that some states, mainly Mississippi went kicking and screaming into the Civil Rights movement of the 60's, all the while most of the rest of the nation was way ahead.

Meet a young woman, Skeeter (Emma Stone). She is a single 24 year old woman, who breaks away from all of her friends who are now married and are helping to perpetuate this vicious cycle of hate in their own homes. Skeeter is a college graduate and wants to be a writer, so she decides to write, and right the wrongs by exposing the real truth behind these hate filled, caddy women of Jackson by penning a book entitled, The Help. The book is the story of the lives of the hired help, as told through the helps eyes. Needless to say, although it's anonymously written and told, it causes quite a stir in the southern town.

The Help is a really great movie that is powerful and inspirational. Incredibly well cast with Stone, Viola Davis, Allyson Janney, Octavia Spenser, Sissy Spacek, and Bryce Dallas Howard in the lead roles. This movie is right out there and honest. It pulls no punches. It shows you first hand the horrible treatment of these people, and the hatred and close mindedness of the era. The Help runs you through all emotions. It's very funny in spots, and very powerful in others. It'll make you angry, sad, happy but most of all it will make you think. Good coffee talk after.

Emma Stone carries the day again, as she marches towards the top, showing great versatility yet again. In the coming years there is little doubt her charm, her humor, and her sense of being real will put her in high demand and should land some more really fantastic roles. Against actors her own age, it is a mismatch. She is light years ahead of the rest of the pack of actors and actresses that would dare to be her contemporaries. She leads a cast that again is stellar from top to bottom. But that being said, The Help in the end, is the kind of movie that really speaks for itself. The best part is, the real star of this movie is....the movie. Great story, well adapted and very well done indeed.

The Help. Adult in nature and content, and really great. I know it's only August, but one of the years best no doubt.