You is kind, you is smart and you is important

In the movie, The Help, that I finally got to see this afternoon, this "you is kind..." line was the most precious exchange between Aibileen, a black maid, and Mae Mobley, the little white baby girl she took care of as part of her job as maid to the Leefolt family.  Not only did these women cook and clean and do laundry for these white families, they also raised their children, loved their children, taught their children.  Mae Mobley is completely ignored by her mother and is kept quiet with cake so she's a little butterball.  Aibileen makes it her mission to make sure Mae Mobley knows that she is loved and that she is special.  I was just SO TOUCHED by this one little part!!  

The movie is awesome.  Amazing.  Funny.  Sad.  Sissy Spacek is hilarious as bad girl Hilly's mama.  I loved the scene of her eating chicken salad and watching her story, a very old Guiding Light! 

The movie is about three women, Skeeter, a white girl who was raised by a black maid (the amazing Cicely Tyson!), and Aibileen and Minny, two black maids.  Skeeter, who aspires to be a writer, comes up with this idea to write a book of stories told by the maids, their own thoughts and feelings about being maids for white families, about taking care of white babies while their own babies are at home being raised by someone else.  The maids don't want any part of it at first because we ARE talking about 1960's Mississippi, at the very cusp of the Civil Rights Movement.  They could lose their jobs or have their homes burned to the ground or worse, they could be killed for even talking about it.  Skeeter convinces them that it'll all be anonymous and they start telling their stories.  Those stories become a published book that rocks the city of Jackson to its core.

I absolutely LOVED it!!  I laughed out loud so many times and I cried twice.  I thought Hilly (played by Bryce Dallas Howard) was just too twisted for color TV and I was tickled to death at her comeuppance.  Did Minny really DO THAT or did she just say she did??  Hmmmm. 

I was happy to see Lafayette from True Blood playing sweet, good guy, Henry the waiter, too.

I loved the beginning, I loved the end and I loved all the in between.  

I expect lots of Oscars to come out of this one.  'Cause they is kind, they is smart and they is important.