After watching this film, many people will interpret it as a matter of fact. This is another film about race. In that special era in the United States, black women were born as slaves or servants, and happened between them and white employers. All kinds of frictions and struggles, the people at the bottom fight for their rights, break racial discrimination and separation, and so on. It is undeniable that the background and story outline of the film is indeed like this, but in my opinion, it has to tell far more than this familiar background routine. It actually tells a story about courage.
The background of the time in the film is a small town called Jackson in the southern United States in the 1960s. At this time, the black civil rights movement has begun to prevail across the country. The white heroine Sikit is a girl who went to college. She received higher education in a big city with more open and inclusive concepts. So when she returned to her hometown, she suddenly became unable to adapt. She couldn't accept that when the outside world was already turbulent, the people in her hometown, especially the group of white ladies who grew up with her playmates, were still conservative, vulgar or even ignorant in their thinking. She was inspired by this, and wanted to take the opportunity of interviewing black maids to describe the white world in their eyes. The whole movie unfolds from here. But this kind of interview did not go smoothly at the beginning, because at that time the southern separation system, although southern blacks were already free people, they also had their own houses, communities, and churches. They could freely choose their employers, and they could also go to study and take college entrance examinations. It seemed that Everything is the same as the rights enjoyed by white people. In fact, the lives of the two are not truly integrated. Black maids are not allowed to use the toilets of white employers. Blacks can only take the last row on the bus, and even the heroine stands on the street. Talking to black people will cause white people to watch and watch. At that time, there were various assassinations. Even President Kennedy and civil rights leader Martin Luther King were not spared. Therefore, you must dare to accept such interviews and tell your true inner feelings. What you face is not only the possibility of unemployment, There will also be a scourge. The first to join the narrator's camp is Ai Bilin, a maid of a female companion of Siqit. The reason why Abilene dared to break the silence was because of her own experience, and on the other hand, she saw the tragic experiences of other maids around her because of this black-and-white separation system. She has been alone since she lost her child in her early years. This kind of pain in turn has made Abilene more courageous and a sense of responsibility than other black maids who swallowed their lives to support her family. When she talked with Schitte in her home for the first time, Abilene was very nervous. She said, "This is the first time a white person has come as a guest in my house." And Schitte just laughed and did not answer. The screenwriter actually planted a foreshadowing. Because Siqit himself also has a story about a black maid. I don’t know if other moviegoers have carefully scrutinized it. The fairness and justice of such a broad-minded and compassionate white girl is definitely not just because of the influence she received from studying abroad, almost It is certain that there is such a role model in her growing up environment. This role model is actually her mother.
Many people may ignore the role of Siqit’s mother. In the first half of the film, she shows a market servant who resembles Siqit’s small-town female companions. She urges her daughters to have a blind date and start a family. Prejudice, until the end, the audience did not know why she fired her maid, who had been employed for 20 years. It turns out that this mother is essentially the same open-minded and tolerant as Sikit (in fact, this is reflected in many of the predecessors in the film). She also regarded the maid as her own relatives and treated her children as her own. Out, there is no black and white in her concept, but what she lacks is courage. As she said to Siqit in the film, "The courage skipped a generation." In private, their generation has fully agreed with the equality and mutual respect between whites and blacks, but in society At the public level, they can’t ignore the impact of the concept of separation of black and white, especially when this concept directly affects their social status and class identity, they can easily act on this powerful oppressive force. Compromise-despite disobedience and guilt. But her daughter Siqite did not compromise. This is the shining quality of the new generation. They inherited the kindness and tolerance of the previous generations, and they also have the fearlessness and bravery given to them by the new era, so people like Siqite It seems inevitable that white girls will stand up and make their own struggles at this sensitive time.
The good thing about this film is that although it talks about a heavy topic, it does not overwhelm people with such a heavy weight; although it seems to say a white girl’s attention and help to a black maid, in fact it It also points out that this kind of help is mutual.
By helping the black maid tell her story, the heroine Siqit repaired the tension between herself and her mother, thereby helping her mother to come out of guilt and regret. Through writing a book, Siqite also changed the atmosphere of the town, making people dare to stand up and fight against all kinds of injustices.
There are two other supporting actors in the film, both of whom were nominated for this year's Oscar for Best Supporting Actress, the maid Minnie and her later white employer Celia. The stories of these two people are relatively lively and interesting. Although Celia was white, she grew up on a farm in the country and had simple social relationships. She was relatively simple and cheerful in her thinking, so she did not have any prejudice against blacks. The maid, Minnie, is even more outspoken, because she committed an unforgivable crime against her former employer, Miss Haili, and was swept out of the house, becoming the maid no one cares about in Jackson Town. This white and black, the former was despised and alienated by the upper-class white wives of the small town because of the silliness of silly gestures that came from a rural village with no social background, while the latter was isolated because of offending the white wives. These two people were on the fringe of the small town society, and came together without being accepted by the public. The capable maid Minnie taught the clumsy Celia to make a variety of food and snacks, and comforted her to ignore the group of white wives. The independent Celia taught Minnie not to succumb to her own destiny and dare to say no to domestic violence. This is not so much a harmonious master-servant relationship as it is a positive and positive interpersonal relationship. After removing their differences in identity and status, they will eventually revert to human beings, and people need warmth and help from each other. , And only under the guidance of such positive emotions can people truly gain courage.
At the end of the film, it was this kind of courage that made the heroine Skit’s mother dared to confront the white lady Haili who represented secular power; it was this kind of courage that allowed Minnie to take her child away from her husband of domestic violence; it was this kind of courage. Let the maid Abilene finally pierce Miss Haili’s hypocrisy and weakness face to face; it is this courage that made the white girl Siqite decide to leave her hometown and continue to explore a wider world; it is also because of this courage that she Prompted great changes in American society. Courage is born of help, and help is sublimated by courage. So don’t simply classify this movie as a racial theme, because courage is always the root of expelling fear in any place that is trapped by darkness. As well as the differences produced by various ideologies, only by helping each other with the original love and tolerance of human beings will it bring real changes to the world.
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