Movie Review On The Butler

The Butler based upon the true story Eugene Allen of a man who served eight American Presidents over the course of his employment as a butler in the White House. Over the course of 34 years working in the White House, the fictional Gaines and the real Allen served as eyewitness of the sweeping changes to civil rights law and attitudes. Some of Allen’s life events are fictionalized for the movie. The real Eugene Allen’s parents did not suffer the same abuses that Gaines’s did in the movie, however the fictional version uses these iconic events to portray how altitudes were disseminated in the 1920’s so that the contrast of President Obama’s Inauguration would stand in sharp relief against that shadowy backdrop.
The social climate is not the only attitude that changes in the course of the movie, “The Butler” himself is transformed as well. His political mind- set grows and develops along with the changing times and values. Part of this has to do with the father-son tensions as his children grow older and develop their own attitudes. As in many families fathers and sons do not always agree. The conflicts between the father and sons, and between the brothers is part of what moves the action along and deepens the emotional content. Their respective reactions to Jim Crow laws segregation, and the choice of one boy to serve in Vietnam while the other joins the Black Panthers all heighten the drama of this film. Each man comes to his own personal understanding of his role, how to survive and still maintain his "manhood: as not just an American and but also as an African American.
Much of the drama in the film centers not on the world or national events but how they play out in the Gaines family. Cecil Gaines is “the Butler” but he is also husband to Gloria Gaines and the father of two sons; Louis and Charles. The film focuses on the relationships in this family and particularly in the relationship between Cecil Gaines and his eldest son Louis. These men both agreed that the laws were wrong, enacted by an unjust society that needed to be educated so that new laws could be enacted and upheld. However they differed greatly on the best way to achieve those ends.
The father chose to conform to his times while his son chose to change the moment he lived in. There are many reasons why these different approaches could exist in one family. Part of the reason the son was free to rebel as strenuously as he did was because of people like his father and their success in bringing about a society where a young black man could rebel without being killed. The elder Gaines grew up in a world where black men had to deal with a more dangerous reality, the film brought this to light with the fate suffered by his parents. This different social reality plays out sharply from the moment Louis choses to attend Fisk University in Tennessee rather that the safer environment of Howard University in Washington. There he is introduced to the principals of non-violent protest by James Lawson and gets himself arrested. This does not help the relationship between the father and his son; it also does not improve his parent’s marriage. Events tumble forward as the Civil Rights movement grows, as does the resistance by groups like the Ku Klux Klan who assault Louis and a dozen or so others on a bus. In the father’s world President Kennedy is working on the Civil Rights act of 1964 that he lives to propose, but not to enact. President Johnson enacts that legislation. The movement goes forward; Martin Luther King Jr. is assonated, Louis founds a chapter of the Black Panthers, his father objects knowing that President Nixon is going to suppress that organization. Louis gets arrested and bailed out by Carter.
The next tragic conflict turns upon when Charlie, the younger son decides to serve in Vietnam. Louis is so opposed to this he tells his young brother that he will not attend the funeral if he is killed. Charlie does die, and Louis does not go to the funeral. Louis remains true to his notions of non-violence by leaving the Black Panthers when they grow more violent. He also remains true to his proactive notions by returning to school, getting his master’s degree and becoming a Congressman. The senior Gaines also more quietly follows his chosen course by working towards equal pay and opportunities for all White House staff, regardless of color. He resigns when Regan refuses to oppose apartheid in South Africa. Gloria helps reconcile her husband and her son, they both come to understand their mutual love and respect and end up joining in a protest against South African Apartheid.
Being the “fly on the wall” in the White House is something most American’s have desired at some point or other in their lives. Over the course of 34 years working in the White House, “The Butler” was just that, an obscure eyewitness to the sweeping changes to civil rights law and attitudes from the very heart of the great power house that engendered and enacted them. He was born into an age where a white plantation owner expected to have the freedom to violate any black women under his control and suffer no repercussions for killing her husband when confronted. For 34 years Gaines worked quietly at the very seat of power, serving the people in charge and doing what he could to right the wrongs and help initiate change. Finally Cecil Gaines saw the changes take place when he witnessed the first black President of the United States elected and Inaugurated.