In a way, The Help is the perfect movie for right now; at a time when a black man can attain the highest office in the land and have competed vigorously for it with a woman, there's nothing like a comforting pat on the back with all assurances that this whole racism thing is behind us, and The Help is exactly that. What's even more comforting is the terms racism is reduced to -- in The Help, racism is not some crazy complex sociological problem, it's just a contest of wills between some uppity white stereotypes and some soulful black stereotypes in a bright, cotton-candy world with attractive people and only abstract concepts to fear, but not too many abstract concepts, because that would be confusing.
I mean, that's not to say that shit doesn't get pretty real around 2:05, but luckily by 2:14 there's a gospel choir and some interracial hugging to let us know it's all going to be okay. I mean, that's pretty much what the March on Washington was, right?
