These films don’t help the racism conversation
The world feels different right now and content is being viewed through a different lens.
With conversation in our culture focused on systematic racism and the treatment of black people after the death of George Floyd while in the custody of Minneapolis police, some are reevaluating Hollywood’s on-screen depictions of racism.
And we have to tell you, some of them have not aged well. On the heels of the news that HBO Max has pulled “Gone with the Wind” to add “historical context,” here are a few films that probably aren’t the most helpful if you are trying to learn more about race and racism:
“The Help” (2011)
Twitter was seething after the film directed by Tate Taylor and based on the same-named 2009 novel written by Kathryn Stockett started trending as protests sprung up following Floyd’s death.
There were concerns even before the movie was released.
Partly because Taylor is a white man, who was tasked with shepherding a story about a pair of black maids, Aibileen Clark (played by Viola Davis) and Minny Jackson (played by Octavia Spencer), set in Jackson, Mississippi during the Civil Rights Movement.
Those voices grew louder after the film hit theatres, as many complained that it focused more on the white character of Eugenia “Skeeter” Phelan (played by Emma Stone).
And while her performance won Spencer a best-supporting actress Oscar, Davis has since said she regrets taking the role.
“I just felt that at the end of the day that it wasn’t the voices of the maids that were heard,” Davis told the New York Times in 2018.
Earlier this week, Bryce Dallas Howard, who played Hilly Holbrook in “The Help,” suggested ten other films to consider viewing to better learn about America’s history of racial inequity.
