Cast : Forest Whitaker : Cecil Gaines Oprah Winfrey : Gloria Gaines John Cusack : Richard Nixon Robin Williams : Eisenhower
Director :
Lee Daniels
Summary
Cecil Gaines was a sharecropper's son who grew up in the 1920s as a
domestic servant for the white family who casually destroyed his.
Eventually striking out on his own, Cecil becomes a hotel valet of such
efficiency and discreteness in the 1950s that he becomes a butler in the
White House itself. There, Cecil would serve numerous US Presidents
over the decades as a passive witness of history with the American Civil
Rights Movement gaining momentum even as his family has troubles of its
own. As his wife, Gloria, struggles with her addictions and his defiant
eldest son, Louis, strives for a just world, Cecil must decide whether
he should take action in his own way.
My opinion "Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that."
"The Butler" is a fascinating historical
look at the struggle of the African- American population for equal rights and
an equal dignity over the years in the U.S. I’m
not sure if it’s completely accurate and historically correct. To
be honest, I was afraid it was going to be as boring as "Lincoln",but
for 2 hours it got my complete attention. And that for a movie that’s
based on historical facts. If only history lessons were like this movie. I do
think it should be mandatory teaching material. A lot of people will say that
this film is strategically launched in order to qualify for an Oscar nomination and
even receive a few of them. To be honest I am not hundred percent sure bout
that. And if that’s a motive to skip this movie, you'll actually miss one of
the best movies of this year.
A
lot of famous stars perform in this film : John Cusack, Jane Fonda, Cuba
Gooding Jr., Terrence Howard, James Marsden, Robin Williams, Vanessa
Redgrave. Even Lenny
Kravitz and Mariah Carey played in it. Although I didn’t recognize them immediately.
However
it’s the lead players who have made a big impression on me. Forest
Whitaker is superb as Cecil Gaines, the butler who worked for eight U.S.
presidents and went through the whole history. From the cotton fields to the
election of Obama as president. In my opinion his best
performance ever. Despite
his passivity, he still shows in a way that he is ambitious and courageous. I
thought he was fighting a silent battle against the injustice that was done to
him. The
scenes where he was present in "The Oval Room" with the president having
a discussion with his advisers, I found sometimes
really touching. Most of these discussions were about controversial issues that
have to do with the colored population. The
way they ignored him as if he was a piece of furniture while those matters actually
concerned him. I also found
it amazing how his aging was realized. Everything is
right and put in a convincing way. On
the other hand, Whitaker has a kind of a sad face with eyes like Droopy. So
making him look sad and concerned wasn’t a hard job.
The
person who made the
biggest impression on me is Oprah Winfrey who played the role of Gloria Gaines.To
be honest, I started watching without any notion of what VIP's were playing
here in this movie. When
I finally recognized her as that annoying attention-grabbing talk show
blabbermouth who always looks for commercial advantage, I was still pleasantly
surprised by her acting performance. I
would even say giving her this role was a big surplus and positive thing for
this movie. And David
Oyelowo played a starring role as the son Louis. A
quiet boy who gradually hated the way his father thought about the
issues that concerned the colored people and began to rebel and
participated in the famous sit ins in places
where blacks were not allowed, the Freedom Buses and later The Black
Panthers. The
peak of dullness in this film is of course the reconciliation with his father at
the end.
The
advantage to watch without knowing who's playing in this movie is that you
always get surprised when familiar faces show up. The
most successful I found Alan Rickman and Jane Fonda as Ronald and Nancy Reagan. Also
Minka Kelly as Jacqueline Kennedy did pretty well. Robin Williams however was a miscast in my opinion. Not
because of his acting performance but I expected every moment he was going to put on a
red clowns nose and throw in a funny one-liner to finish.
The film
itself covered a lot of historical events : The cotton plantation, the first
blacks at a university, the Freedom Buses, the Ku Klux Klan, JFK, Sidney
Poitier, Vietnam, the death of Luther King, Mandela and Obama. That’s a lot to
cover in a single movie. But
it didn’t really bother me.
A must-see
movie for me at least. It’s
basically a cinematic documentary of the darkest, ugliest and saddest period in American
history. And sadly it’s still actual and happens day by day in our modern civilized society. And
then realizing it wasn’t that long ago. For me definitely an Oscar worthy. But
let’s hope this movie is the apotheosis on this subject cause recent years we
were flooded by such movies.
Genre : Drama/History
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