The Help

This movie is surrounded by so much controversy.  After reading several articles both in support and in criticism of it, and seeing the film myself, I think I would say that it is definitely worth seeing, but I would encourage anyone that does go to not let the credits be the end of your thoughts on the matter.  Go see it, and then go read articles like this one or this one, that raise concerns about the portrayal of black women and the historical accuracy of this fictional tale, and then read something like this one or this one in support of the film, and maybe discuss the film with your viewing partners and decide what you think for yourselves.  You could also read my analysis of some of the dialogue.  This could be a great opportunity for education and honest discussion, so don’t let it be merely an excuse to munch popcorn for two and a half hours.

The story is about a recent 1960s college graduate, Skeeter, (Emma Stone), trying to become a serious writer and finding inspiration from the social clashes she observes between her white friends and family and their black maids.  Skeeter sets out to “write a story from the point of the view of the help,” assisted by Aibileen (Viola Davis) and Minnie (Octavia Spencer).  There are several other subplots along the way of course, but that’s the main thrust.  And whether Skeeter’s motives or “right” to tell their story is questionable or not, it is Biblical to give a voice to the voiceless.  Proverbs 31:8-9 states,

Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute.  Speak up and judge fairly; defend the rights of the poor and needy.

The book that this movie brings to life has been very popular in American book clubs, and the movie has been very popular as well, winning the weekend box office the last two weeks.  But to me, that only adds to the complicated questions surrounding it–if it is, as some have said, an unfair or unrealistic portrayal of black history, then what does it’s popularity say about our present society?  It’s an uncomfortable question; race is an uncomfortable subject in this country.

But maybe part of the reason this story is so easy for people to enjoy is because, really, the conflict is almost like the high school drama in Mean Girls.  A bunch of women not getting along and being mean to each other in various ways.  And one of the reasons for the excluding and the devaluing is racism, but another is plain snobbery (evidenced by Hilly’s mandates against the “white trash” Celia).  The villainous Hilly and her minions are just as much of caricatures as the Plastics in Mean Girls, their social triumphs and defeats equally trivial.  I think that’s what some people are so bothered by, because the Civil Rights movement and the realities of racial segregation were not trivial, petty social battles.

In any case, I do think it is a pretty good movie, worth seeing.  The rating is PG-13, but I think some of it might be too heavy for a young teen.  [**SPOILER ALERT** A miscarriage scene is quite graphic, with the bereaved, sobbing mother exclaiming “why is there so much blood?” Minnie’s husband beats her, and although the action is not seen, we hear him yelling at her.  Yule Mae is struck in the head by a police officer’s baton.  There is quite a bit of discussion regarding someone’s sh-t.  **END SPOILER**]  If you go see it, keep the context, (that it’s a popular movie surrounded by some reasonable criticisms,) in mind.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, part 2

This one’s not quite like a normal review.  I’m not going to summarize everything or give you the background, because there’s too much of it, and I don’t know why you would have watched this final film if you hadn’t seen all the others and/or read all the books, anyway.  So I’m just going to go over some of my thoughts with regards to some of the themes, and how they line up with the Bible.

Firstly, there is a pretty excellent parallel that can be drawn between this film and the passage in 1Corinthians 12, on spiritual gifts.  Yes, yes, Harry’s the only one who can defeat Voldemort, (according to the prophecy), but he would never have succeeded without the help of all his allies!  Everyone has an essential role.  Everyone that fights to protect the castle and give him time to find the diadem horcrux, Ron and Hermione who destroy the cup horcrux, Neville who destroys the snake horcrux.  Dobby who saved them at the end of the last film.  Harry’s efforts would have been in vain, and he most likely would have failed anyway, without the help of every last person who fought.  And so, even though Harry is “The Chosen One,” his friends and supporters are every bit as important and heroic.

The eye cannot say to the hand, “I don’t need you!”  And the head cannot say to the feet, “I don’t need you!”  On the contrary, those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensible.” -1 Cor. 12:21-22

That last bit really makes me think of Neville.  Go Neville!

"those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensible"

Harry is not my favorite character, and I like him a bit less in the movies than the books, (because the movies insist on making him even more foolishly reckless), but I do admire Harry’s bravery.  In this film he does willingly go into the woods like a lamb to slaughter fully intending to die for his friends, once he realizes that it is what needs to be done to end Voldemort’s reign of terror and save everyone else.  The Bible says,

Greater love has no man than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. -John 15:13

It is a selfless act, but let’s be clear, Harry is not a Christ figure.  He doesn’t promise to save people spiritually, only physically.  He isn’t a blameless sacrificial lamb.  The reason it must be him is in fact not because he’s so good, but because he has such a bit of evilness inside him, (his horcrux scar), that it must be destroyed.  And so, Harry is brave and selfless not to resist, to realize that however much he may want to preserve his own life, doing so would prolong the suffering and harm of others.  But he isn’t Christ.  And his coming “back to life” is not synonymous with Christ’s resurrection, because for one thing, it isn’t clear whether he was actually dead or merely unconscious during that interlude, (he certainly wasn’t pierced in the side and buried for three days), and secondly even if he did “die” and then come back to life, the explanation would be that it was because he possessed the three Deathly Hallows and was master of death through mystical relics, not his own power.  Christ’s resurrection allows us to say,

Death has been swallowed up in victory.

-1 Cor. 15:54

Harry’s “resurrection” only means a victory for him, but Christ’s victory over death is for all who believe and call him Lord.  (That verse comes from the same passage as the lines on Harry’s parents’ gravestone, by the way.)

"The last enemy to be destroyed is death."

Finally, there is Snape.  Oh, my beloved, tragic Snape.  My feelings about Snape are complicated; on the one hand, I want to defend him, (I wore a home-made shirt that read “I believe in Snape” to the midnight release of the final book, so confident was I that his true loyalties were with Dumbledore), and I want to praise his incredible bravery and selflessness.  But the truth is that much of his heartbreaking misery was of his own making.  Poor Snape, who cuts himself off from all supportive fellowship with everyone but Dumbledore, and then he is forced to kill the one person that knew and believed in the real him!  But he didn’t have to be so alone!  His insistence that Dumbledore never tell anyone of his love for Lily is motivated only by pride.  And he clings to his bitterness towards James, allowing it to poison his relationship with Harry as well, overshadowing the fact that Harry is Lily’s legacy, her own flesh and blood.  And yes, Snape sacrifices everything to protect Harry because he is Lily’s son, but what if he had been able to overcome his jealousy, hurt, and anger, and been an actual father figure towards Harry? It’s easily the largest part of Snape’s tragedy, that he misses out on what could have been such a meaningful relationship because he can’t let go of the past.  As my friend EBR pointed out to me, the image of Snape clinging to Lily’s lifeless body while ignoring her living, crying son in the background is a perfect illustration of how he chose to focus his energies for all those years.

Snape is without question a hero, but he’s not one that we can unquestionably emulate.  Be like Snape in the way he remains thanklessly devoted to his goal.  Be like Snape in the way his every choice and his every action is in service of the welfare of someone other than himself.  Be like Snape in the way the core of his being is defined by an everlasting, gut-wrenching love and devotion.  But don’t be like Snape in the way he clings to the dead and fails to engage with those living around him, how he chooses to exile himself from fellowship, how he chooses to live alone and bear a needlessly solitary burden of pain and bitterness instead of opening himself up to the healing possibilities of reconciliation and forgiveness.  (Snape is the eye that tried to say to the rest of the body, “I don’t need you!”).

Oh, and do try to be like Snape in the way he speaks so clearly, slowly, and deliberately.  “Ex………pelliarmus!”  Love it.

Green Lantern

*Sigh*  Poor Ryan Reynolds.  I like you, and I really wanted to like your movie, but it was not good.  Maybe if I was already familiar with the comics it would have been more enjoyable, since I wouldn’t have been frustrated by the lack of adequately explained relationships or character development, and I might have been excited enough at seeing characters come to life to overlook their clunky dialogue.  But it was not so, and just like a Lantern, ‘no evil [terrible movie element] shall escape my sight.’

Here’s the backstory, as gleaned by me from this film: The Guardians are immortal beings who “made all you see and are responsible for all we are,” (spoken by a Lantern on Oa and so possibly referring to that particular planet and the Green Lantern corps, but ambiguously allowing for an interpretation that includes the entire universe and really either way setting this council of oversized-cranium creatures that sit immobile in a giant Stonehenge-esque circle as gods.)  These beings “harnessed the emerald energy of willpower” however many eons ago, because they decided it was the “strongest energy in the universe.”  That’s what the green rings are all about, being able to manipulate matter, I guess, according to whatever your will is?  But you also need a lantern, to charge the ring, apparently?  Or something.  And to wear a green ring and be a Green Lantern of the Green Lantern corps you have to be “without fear.”  Because “fear is what stops you and makes you weak.”  But the rings chose their own wearers, so it’s not like you have to pass any sort of test or know anything about yourself and what you are capable of, the ring will do the self-evaluating for you!  Handy.

Anyway, a rogue member of The Guardians had wanted to harness the power of fear instead of will, (should I be capitalizing those abstract nouns?), an idea rejected by the rest of the council because “the power of fear is too unpredictable, the chance for corruption too great.”  Interesting…by implication then willpower is predictable and incorruptible?  I don’t think that’s exactly what has been evidenced throughout history.  And it’s certainly in direct opposition to The Lord of the Rings, for example, when the One Ring of power is forged with Sauron’s “will to dominate all life,” and binds the will of the nine human lords with lesser rings to his own, and when Isildur has a chance to destroy it he doesn’t because “the hearts of men are easily corrupted,” etc. etc.  Then you have Harry Potter which pretty much argues that self-sacrificing love is the greatest power, the strongest and oldest magic.  And God, the real immortal who really is responsible for creating everything we see, is actually the ultimate power in the universe.  No, I remain unconvinced that the strongest, most incorruptible power in the universe is willpower, although it is amazing what sheer will can accomplish.  But sometimes girls use a steely willpower to starve themselves; is it a virtue then? I would agree it is perhaps the strongest force to use against fear, as Scottish poet Joanna Baillie so eloquently put it:

“The brave man is not he who feels no fear,
For that were stupid and irrational;
But he, whose noble soul its fears subdues,
And bravely dares the danger nature shrinks from.”

That’s certainly one of the themes to Green Lantern, and it’s a good one.  Bravery is an action, a decision, not a feeling.  In any case, the rogue (maverick!) Guardian goes off by himself and tries to harness fear, and it all goes awry and he becomes the Big Bad, Parallax.  He feeds on people’s fears, which according to the CGI come popping out of bodies in skeletal form.  He’s destroying everything in his path and headed for earth. (I’m skipping a lot of details and subplots, because it would just devolve into script criticisms.  Seriously.  It’s terrible.)

The Guardians don’t think fighting Parallax is worth the risk, and you know, they are all wise and stuff because they have to consider eternity in their decisions.  This doesn’t really make sense to me, but oh well.  Newly minted Green Lantern Corps member (and first human to wear the ring) Hal Jordan tries to persuade them otherwise.  (Why does he need permission to fight for his world?)  “I know humans are a young species, and we have much to learn,” Hal says, “but we are worth saving!”  Long pause…crickets…this is the part, Hal, where you reinforce your position with supporting facts, or at least emotional appeals.  Why are humans worth saving?  The movie doesn’t even try to come up with an answer.  Battlestar Galactica’s Sharon Valerii (Athena) would be so dissapointed.  She’s the Cylon that tells Adama, in answer to his question about why the Cylons are out to destroy humanity,

“You said that humanity was a flawed creation, and that people still kill one another for petty jealousy and greed. You said that humanity never asked itself why it deserved to survive. Maybe you don’t.”

No, we don’t.  There is no argument that can be made on the basis of how even the best of us behave.  We’re all flawed and corrupt and selfish and fallen.  But God thinks we are worth saving.  Not because we deserve it, not because of anything we’ve done or failed to do, but because he loves us.

^“7 Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. ⁸ But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”   -Romans 5:7-8

That’s not a message you’ll find in Green Lantern.  It’s just a bad script, decent but omnipresent CGI, awkward dialogue, good acting from Peter Sarsgaard and Ryan Reynolds, bad acting from Blake Lively, and an overall message that fear=bad and willpower=good.  Reality is much more complicated.  Green Lantern’s light doesn’t shine on anything useful.

Ryan Reynolds' willpower isn't strong enough to conjure up a better script