Remember last week when we wanted to see this movie but it was sold out for all the showings on a Saturday afternoon - so we saw "Cowboy and Aliens" instead?
Yesterday we had better luck. We went to see the 3:45 PM showing. It was sold out so we bought tickets for the 4:15 PM which was showing on two screens at the Regal. They, eventually, were sold out as well.
I'm a little puzzled about why this movie is doing so well. But, of course, I'm happy about it.
"The Help" takes place in Jackson, Mississippi in 1963. Skeeter, an aspiring writer, ends up writing an expose about how maids were being treated by their beautiful young junior leaguing racist housewife employers. Skeeter couldn't have done it without the bravery of the maids.
For some of us who lived through these times, the book and the movie have been cathartic. Some critics have called it "light weight" because it deals with dopey women and their maids. And then there's Sceeter, who gets very brave and serious.
I think, throughout history, folks living every day lives have been the ones to make great changes. Sometimes when they've perceived just a little bit of inner power from outer circumstances (like Skeeter) and some who've done the brave thing because they've reached bottom (like the maids.)
Freedom's just another word for nothin' left to lose.
On February 3, 2010 I wrote a blog posting called "The Help" after reading the novel. In it I shared some of my own adventures as a young, white housewife from the North, living in Fort Lauderdale, Florida in the same time period in which "The Help" takes place. And then the decade of the 70s which was just as turbulent.
I was an ordinary person who, somehow, was able to do some small but extraordinary things. But extraordinary things were happening everywhere in the country.
The following events were significant for me:
- June 12, 1963 - Medgar Evers was shot and killed.
- November 22, 1963 - John F. Kennedy was shot and killed.
- April 4, 1968 - Martin Luther King was shot and killed.
- June 5, 1968 - Bobby Kennedy was shot and killed.
Go see the movie. It's not about Jackson, Mississippi. It's about us.
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