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Workingman’s Hero

Eugene Allen, a White House butler for more than 30 years, inspired Lee Daniels’ “The Butler.” Forest Whitaker stars.

Eugene Allen, a White House butler for more than 30 years, inspired Lee Daniels’ “The Butler.” Forest Whitaker stars. Courtesy Follow Through Productions

In Lee Daniels' "The Butler," everyone loves Cecil Gaines (Forest Whitaker) because he never says what he thinks. He's a butler, trained as a house servant after a white man rapes his mother (Mariah Carey) and murders his father (David Banner). Before this tragedy, Cecil worked with his parents as a field hand.

Miss Annabeth (Vanessa Redgrave), the plantation matriarch, shows a bit of kindness to young Cecil by taking him into the big house. She teaches Cecil the secrets of fine service.

"The room must feel empty when you're in it," she tells him.

The true story of Eugene Allen, a White House butler for more than 30 years, was the inspiration for Danny Strong's screenplay for the film. In this highly fictionalized account, Cecil is the workingman's hero. He never dreams of a big life. He feels blessed to have a job at a swanky hotel in Washington, D.C., giving him the ability to financially support his wife, Gloria (Oprah Winfrey), so she can stay home and raise their two boys. The White House notices Cecil's apolitical and unassuming ways and hires him, and Cecil serves as a butler under eight presidents (played by a star-studded list, including Robin Williams, James Marsden, John Cusack and Alan Rickman).

Daniels crosscuts news clips, home-styled videos and historical events with Cecil's personal life. While Cecil polishes silver and sets a magnificent table for a White House state dinner, his son Louis (David Oyelowo) endures taunts and scalding coffee thrown in his face at a Woolworth sit-in. Louis' younger brother Charlie (Elijah Kelley) enlists to fight in Vietnam. The opposing ways Cecil and Louis deal with bigotry, injustice and racial discrimination is the glue that holds this film together as it swings back and forth from inspiration to disillusionment.

In a defining scene, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. (Nelsan Ellis) explains to Louis the vital role of domestic help in black history. Through hard work and subservience, the butler slowly tears down the stereotypes and becomes subversive without knowing it.

This movie ambitiously introduces dozens of characters. Under Daniels' direction, the entire cast pulls out one phenomenal performance after another. Whitaker's performance, in particular, is a breathtaking balance of quiet truths and smoldering anger. It's in his eyes and the way he moves his body. Oyelowo's Louis counters with fine nuances. He's an angry Hamlet in an American nightmare.

Winfrey is a fireball of maternal conviction. At a reconciliation dinner, Cecil says that Sidney Poitier's character in "In The Heat of the Night" reminds him of Louis, and Louis responds by calling Poitier a rich Uncle Tom. Cecil explodes, demanding his puffed-up son and belching girlfriend leave his house. In a stand-by-her-man moment, Gloria backhands her son when he sasses his dad. Like Whitaker and Oyelowo, Winfrey delivers an Oscar-caliber performance.

Not known for his subtle touch, Daniels (who directed "Precious" and produced "Monster's Ball") broadcasts a righteous indignation. He visually telegraphs the big moments with symbolic close-ups and further escalates the emotional drama with a fully loaded orchestra, ready on command to shatter your complacency with scores of violins.

With 41 credited producers and a star-studded cast at least as long, this film is operatic and a touch too "Forrest Gump" as Cecil witnesses 30 years of historic events in the Oval Office. It's also radically uneven, which happens when one approaches subject matter with an unyielding passion. Despite that, I laughed. I cried. I clapped as loudly as anyone else in the theater by the movie's end.

Comments

notmuch 10 years, 7 months ago

The true story of Eugene Allen may have been the inspiration for this story, but "highly fictionalized" pretty much sums it up. Eugene Allen was an active Republican. His mother was not raped, nor was his father killed, by the "boss" on a Georgia farm, as depicted in the movie. His only son was not a Black Panther who later ran for public office, but rather an investigator for the State Department. He did not resign under Reagan in protest of racist policies as portrayed in the movie; in fact, Mr. Allen and his wife enjoyed a State Dinner with the Reagans as guests, not as employees.
Of course, none of the boring facts would have made much money for anyone, so let's spice it up to keep fanning those flames of racial hatred!

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justjess 10 years, 7 months ago

@notmuch

"Of course, none of the boring facts would have made much money for anyone, so let's spice it up to keep fanning those flames of racial hatred!"

Wouldn't it be a fair assessment to say that through your eyes and thought processes, a butler was treated kindly and paid fairly? That NO black woman was the "house bitch" for many plantation owners? Do you really think that our light, bright, damn near white - brothers and sisters happened through the natural process of adaptation to climatic conditions? METAMORPHOSIS? That being a Republican during that era made you an equal as invited guest of Ronald Reagan? Please remember that Dr. Martin Luther King was a Republican: He was jailed, beaten, chased by dogs, sprayed with fire-fighter water hoses and eventually shot down like a dog for fighting for men who worked as garbage collectors and for Civil Rights for ALL.

Symbolism is lost on people who have no vision; just as truth is lost on people who deny it!

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notmuch 10 years, 7 months ago

I am really curious if you could explain to me how you took my comments regarding a movie about one particular person, and from that extrapolated ("through my eyes and thought processes") ridiculous statements about the pay scale for butlers, and the treatment of "house b_"? I don't even know where to begin to respond to your "light, bright, d near white" question, because I cannot begin to understand what you are trying to ask.

Yes, I am well aware that Dr. King was a Republican, as were most blacks, until the Democrats came up with the strategy that would eventually turn the tide from self-pride and self-sufficiency to dependency.

I agree with your final sentence 100%.

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donnaladd 10 years, 7 months ago

Most African Americans were Republican before the GOP defied its roots and became the new party of Dixiecrars after Johnson signed civil rights act.

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justjess 10 years, 7 months ago

@notmuch

"Yes, I am well aware that Dr. King was a Republican, as were most blacks, until the Democrats came up with the strategy that would eventually turn the tide from self-pride and self-sufficiency to dependency."

Are you aware of the fact that blacks do not have a monoply on dependency? More whites are dependent on government sponsored programs, i.e., welfare and that these numbers are based on ratio and proportion.

Your comment about "dependency" supports the contention that Black folks are negatively evaluated, conscious and unconscious, by many. Prehaps it will be helpful for you to read Dr. James Silver's book entitled "Mississippi the Closed Society".

To even suggest that my people have no self-pride or self-sufficiency since the change from Republican to Democrat is ludicrous!

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donnaladd 10 years, 7 months ago

notmuch, the parties switched because national Democrats started supporting civil rights legislation and turned on Jim Crow laws. Finally. The tragedy is that Goldwater, Nixon, Reagan and, yes, young Harley Barbour saw it as a chance to lure former Dixiecrats into the GOP.

Thus, the GOP's current identity crisis over selling its soul to the devil. The racist devil still wants its due, and more educated, progressive Republicans are facing a party crisis. The irony is that Reagan, who was downright liberal by today's GOP standards, helped make it happen to get easy votes.

Otherwise, your comments about dependency are sorely ignorant, but the exact meme that the New Dixiecrat Party has pushed since the switch. You're drinking the Koolaid. Go figure. That was the goal. The whole point was to get southern whites to blame black people for today's problems and, thus, join the Republican Party, and to raise their kids to believe the same thing. Fortunately, fewer young people, even here, are buying the lies.

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