The Help

[Deleted]

I haven't seen the movie or read the book, but every time that pie is referenced, all I can think about is that if that had been real life, somebody's house would have burned down, and most likely with them in it. I can't get beyond the reality of terrible things that did happen enough to want to watch a fantasy on the screen.

[ladytrentham]

Mar 7, 2012 18:25:19 GMT -4 @livingfortheweeken said:

I haven't seen the movie or read the book, but every time that pie is referenced, all I can think about is that if that had been real life, somebody's house would have burned down, and most ilkely with them in it. I can't get beyond the reality of terrible things that did happen enough to want to watch a fantasy on the screen.

I totally agree; that was a plot hole you could drive a truck through.

[Deleted]

Mar 7, 2012 19:26:04 GMT -4 ladytrentham said:

Mar 7, 2012 18:25:19 GMT -4 @livingfortheweeken said:

I haven't seen the movie or read the book, but every time that pie is referenced, all I can think about is that if that had been real life, somebody's house would have burned down, and most ilkely with them in it. I can't get beyond the reality of terrible things that did happen enough to want to watch a fantasy on the screen.

I totally agree; that was a plot hole you could drive a truck through.

Yeah, the pie thing doesn't work if you think about it for more than 2 seconds. Super clean and neat Minnie, who takes so much pride in her cooking, would really collect her own shit and then ruin her own bowls and cooking utensils by whipping it up in her own kitchen? Not to mention the money she would have wasted on the other ingredients, money she didn't have.

I will say, in the book it is made clear that Aibilene and Minnie's lives are at risk because of what they've done, but the book ends before any major retaliation happens. It's kind of a weird ending, because it's implied that a horrible fate could still be awaiting them, but well, we'll just close the book and leave them there. I had the feeling that the author liked her main characters too much to make them suffer, so all the really bad stuff happened to other people (Constantine, Yule May, Louvenia's son (grandson?), who's beaten and goes blind).

[Mugsy]

If Minnie was visibly punished for the pie (burning her house down, for example, as mentioned above), then everyone would know it happened to someone in that town and be able to deduce that the victim was Hilly. I thought the point of putting the pie incident in the book was so Hilly would be sure to insist to one and all that the events and people in the book were definitely NOT her town. Hilly probably didn’t even want her own husband to know what happened, who would?

As for Minnie sullying her bowls and things with her shit, that’s nothing a little bleach wouldn’t fix. It’s not much different than wiping kids’ butts and then washing one’s hands afterwards before working in the kitchen.

[ladytrentham]

JMHO, but I think Minny's life was at risk the second she let Hilly know what she was eating. All Hilly would have to do is go to whatever "white citizens' committee" member, or "wizard," who was in charge of such things and say that Minny needed to be targeted--Hilly wouldn't even have to say why. There were all sorts of hints that Hilly had those kinds of connections. And there were a few months between the pie eating and the book publishing. Hilly could have arranged Minny's fate, without ever letting on why, and people most likely wouldn't have questioned it.

[chiqui]

I only saw the movie, but in the book, is it 100% clear what's in the pie? The way it played in the movie, it seemed like it was a normal pie, and Minny just *said* it was a sh*t pie. Because who would, or could, prove it? Hilly couldn't tell by the taste.

[chonies]

Mar 9, 2012 16:40:32 GMT -4 chiqui said:

I only saw the movie, but in the book, is it 100% clear what's in the pie? The way it played in the movie, it seemed like it was a normal pie, and Minny just *said* it was a sh*t pie. Because who would, or could, prove it? Hilly couldn't tell by the taste.

I didn't see the movie, but this was a huge item of contention in book club. In the text, which I don't have handy, it's actually somewhat unclear. I think it comes up in a conversation, and someone else expresses doubt. IIRC, there's enough ambiguity in the narrative that it might have been a threat, or it might have been real. In book club, opinion was split fairly evenly. Personally, I think it's kind of ridiculous, but it's also where I stopped reading because the whole idea seemed...preposterous? unlikely? disruptive, at the very least.

[Ladybug]

To me the biggest plot hole with the sh*t pie was this: wouldn't it have made Hilly really, really sick? She could've purged most of it, but not all of it. Wouldn't she get E Coli type food poisoning from eating someone's poop?

And I agree that Hilly would've never let that act go unpunished. She didn't even have to tell the truth about the incident, all she would've had to say was that Minnie assaulted her or something and that would've been enough to get her arrested, put in jail, or worse.

Also, in the book, it took a couple of years for Skeeter and Aibileen to write the book and get it published. So there was a significant amount of time between the pie incident and the publication of the book.

[ladytrentham]

I read somewhere, can't remember where exactly, that it was actually quite a common form of retaliation for black women workers to pull a "terrible awful" on abusive white employers. The key was TO NOT LET THE VICTIMS KNOW ABOUT IT.

And in the film at least (haven't read the book yet) before dessert was delivered, Hilly had already spread the lie that Minny had stolen a candelabra.

Come to think of it, wasn't there a scene in Roots where someone spat in a white's drink? Can't remember...

[Neurochick]

Mar 13, 2012 12:58:02 GMT -4 ladytrentham said:

I read somewhere, can't remember where exactly, that it was actually quite a common form of retaliation for black women workers to pull a "terrible awful" on abusive white employers. The key was TO NOT LET THE VICTIMS KNOW ABOUT IT.

And in the film at least (haven't read the book yet) before dessert was delivered, Hilly had already spread the lie that Minny had stolen a candelabra.

Come to think of it, wasn't there a scene in Roots where someone spat in a white's drink? Can't remember...

Yes you're right about Roots. A family member of mine once said that black people have to be the most decent people in the world, because they could have poisoned nearly every man, woman and child in the South, and no one would have known, especially during the times there were no such things as toxicology reports.