"The Help," rated PG-13, is being released August 10th and stars Emma Stone as Eugenia "Skeeter" Phelan, Bryce Dallas Howard as Hilly Holbrook, Viola Davis as Aibileen Clark, Octavia Spencer as Minny Jackson, Mike Vogel as Johnny Foote, Allison Janney as Charlotte Phelan, Chris Lowell as Stuart Whitworth, Jessica Chastain as Celia Foote, Sissy Spacek as Mrs. Walters, Ahna O'Reilly as Elizabeth Leefolt, Brian Kerwin as Robert Phelan, Leslie Jordan as Mr. Blackly, Dana Ivey as Grace Higgenbottom, Cicely Tyson as Constantine Bates, Anna Camp as Jolene French, David Oyelowo as Preacher Green and Lila Rogers as Young Skeeter. Directed by Tate Taylor. The Help (2011) is a Drama and Adaptation movie and the film distributed by DreamWorks Studios. At the dawn of the civil rights movement, three Mississippi women are about to take one extraordinary step. Twenty-two-year-old Skeeter has just returned home after graduating from Ole Miss and her mother won't be happy till she finds a husband. Aibileen, a wise African-American maid and caretaker suffers after the loss of her own child. And Minny, Aibileen's sassy best friend, struggles to find and hold a job. Seemingly as different from one another as can be, these women will nonetheless come together for a clandestine project that will put them all at risk. Watch The Help (2011) movie free stream online.
In December 2009, Variety reported that Chris Columbus, Michael Barnathan, and Mark Radcliffe would produce a film adaptation of The Help, under their production company 1492 Prods. Brunson Green of Harbinger Productions also co-produced. The film was written and directed by Stockett's childhood friend, Tate Taylor, who optioned film rights to the book before its release.
The first casting news for the production came in March 2010, when it was reported that Emma Stone was attached to play the role of Skeeter Phelan. Other actors were since cast, including Viola Davis as Aibileen; Bryce Dallas Howard as Hilly Holbrook, Jackson's snooty town ringleader; Allison Janney as Charlotte Phelan, Skeeter's mother; and Chris Lowell as Stuart Whitworth, Skeeter's boyfriend and a senator's son. Leslie Jordan appears as the editor of the fictional local newspaper, The Jackson Journal. Mike Vogel plays the character Johnny Foote. Octavia Spencer portrays Minny. A longtime friend of Stockett and Taylor, Spencer inspired the character of Minny in Stockett's novel and voiced her in the audiobook version.
Filming of The Help began in July 2010 and extended through October. The town of Greenwood, Mississippi was chosen to portray 1960s-era Jackson, and producer Brunson Green said he had expected to shoot "95 percent" of the movie there. Parts of the film were also shot in the real-life Jackson, as well as in nearby Clarksdale and Greenville. One of the few locations that existed in 1963 Jackson, the book and the movie is Jackson landmark Brent's Drugs, which dates to 1946. Other locations that can still be found in Jackson include the New Capitol Building and the Mayflower Cafe downtown. Scenes set at the Jackson Journal office were shot in Clarksdale at the building which formerly housed the Clarksdale Press Register for forty years until April 2010.
The Help was the most significant film production in Mississippi since 2000's O Brother, Where Art Thou? "Honestly, my heart would be broken if it were set anywhere but Mississippi," Stockett wrote in an e-mail to reporters. In order to convince producers to shoot in Greenwood, Tate Taylor and others had previously come to the town and scouted out locations; at his first meeting with DreamWorks executives, he presented them with a photo album of potential filming spots in the area. The state's tax incentive program for filmmakers was also a key enticement in the decision.
On October 13, 2010, Touchstone Pictures and DreamWorks gave the film a release date of August 12, 2011. On July 5, 2011, the film was bumped up two days to August 10, 2011.
On its opening day, The Help grossed $5.5 million and also achieved the highest gross of the day. It then went on to make an additional $4.3 million on Thursday bringing its two day total to $9.8 million. For its opening weekend, The Help grossed $26.0 million and came in second place to Rise of the Planet of the Apes. During its second weekend, The Help reached the number one spot at the box office and came in with $20.0 million.
As of August 21, 2011 The Help has grossed $71,340,829.
The Help received generally positive reviews from critics. Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reported that 73% of 122 professional critics gave the film a positive review, and a score of 68% from 40 top critics' reviews. Another review aggregator, Metacritic, which assigns a weighted average score out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, gives the film a score of 62, based on 37 reviews. CinemaScore polls reported that the average grade moviegoers gave the film was an A plus on an A plus to F scale.
Tom Long from Detroit News remarked about the film: "Appalling, entertaining, touching and perhaps even a bit healing, The Help is an old-fashioned grand yarn of a film, the sort we rarely get these days." Connie Ogle of the Miami Herald gave the film three out of four stars and said it "will make you laugh, yes, but it can also break your heart. In the dog days of August moviegoing, that's a powerful recommendation."
More on the mixed side was Karina Longworth of the Village Voice: "We get a fairly typical Hollywood flattening of history, with powerful villains and disenfranchised heroes." Rick Gloen of The Globe and Mail, giving the film two out of four stars, said: "Typically, this sort of film is an earnest tear-jerker with moments of levity. Instead, what we have here is a raucous rib-tickler with occasional pauses for a little dramatic relief."
Some of the negative reviews criticized the film for its inability to match the book's level of greatness. Chris Hewitt of the St. Paul Pioneer Press said about the film: "Some adaptations find a fresh, cinematic way to convey a book's spirit but "The Help" doesn't.
Many critics praised the performances of Viola Davis and Octavia Spencer. Wilson Morales of Blackfilm.com gave the movie 3 out of 4 stars and commented,"With powerful performances given by Viola Davis and scene stealer Octavia Spencer, the film is an emotionally, moving drama that remains highly entertaining." David Edelstein from New York Magazine commented that, "The Help belongs to Viola Davis."
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