How Does Tate Hilly Build Suspense In The Help

In the film, “The Help” directed by Tate Taylor, an important relationship for me was that between Minny and Hilly. The two of them placed in the same room together created for some hilariously memorable scenes, including the scene where Minny gets fired and the iconic “eat my shit scene”.

The first scene I am going to introduce to you is the scene where Minny gets fired. There was a raging storm going outside and while Minny as like all other black maids in this era of history would commonly go outside in the separate bathroom reserved for blacks only should she ever feel the need to ‘relieve herself’. Going outside and getting saturated in the thunder and lightning was very clearly not high on her priority list that day and Tate Taylor 's

All throughout the movie leading up to this point any conversation between Minny and Aibileen where the topic of Hilly came up, so would the “terrible awful” she did to Hilly, this is an example of some great language features used throughout this movie as whenever they would discuss said “terrible awful”, there would always be a nervous edge in Minny’s tone, creating suspense for the viewers as we waited anxiously to hear what could be so bad that even Minny was scared. When the time comes for Minny to finally confess her sins to Aibileen and Skeeter, the scene opens to Minny narrating the event as it unfolds, standing on the porch outside Hilly’s house, we watch as Hilly stares down at her is disdain. “Sorry” Hilly’s scowl is interrupted as Minny is the first to speak, Hilly, a somewhat smug expression on her face is quick to turn on her heels and gesture at Minny, beckoning her to come inside. Cutting to Hilly 's dining hall, we watch as mouthful after mouthful Hilly engulfs two slices of Minny 's famous chocolate pie while a somewhat satisfactory smile rests upon Minnie 's face, conversation ensues with Hilly insulting and calling Minny derogative names until, clearly having had enough Minny states confidently "Eat my shit." The utter shock on Hilly’s face is delightful as she questions "Excuse me?", Minny now on a roll leans forward slightly and slowly baring her teeth repeats her previous statement

Minny and Hilly’s on screen chemistry was a fantastic play on what happens when a classic 60’s “Southern Belle” white girl comes face to face with a walking hot fiery ball of snark and sass. In my opinion Minny and Hilly are the most underrated relationship in this whole movie, yet if they had more onscreen time together, the humorous conversations that occurred between the two would have taken away from the seriousness of the movie and as an audience member I feel that Tate Taylor blended the mix of racism and humour perfectly creating the “happy ending” that I as an audience member was hoping for, to see the villain vanquished and the hero prevail. This happy ending for Minny was a scene that built up enough suspense for the entire audience to be placed at the edge of their seats, watching in pent up anticipation, mouths open in shock as Minny’s sweet revenge clicked into play. I feel that not only did these two affect each other with their ongoing banter and snark between each other, but also their surrounding characters. Hilly and Minny’s relationship was the perfect representation of what every white girl didn’t want to have with their maid and the comparison between Hilly and Minny to everyone else was obvious, No relationship came close to the horribleness of theirs and this was a great positive influence on everyone else as they treated their maids much more fairly than Hilly did to