Lee Daniels' The Butler Review

Rated PG-13 (Some Violence and Disturbing Images, Language, Sexual Material, Thematic Elements and Smoking)

Running Time: 2 Hours & 12 Minutes

Cast-

Forest Whitaker-Cecil Gaines

Oprah Winfrey-Gloria Gaines

David Oyelowo-Louis Gaines

Elijah Kelley-Charlie Gaines

Cuba Gooding, Jr.-Carter Wilson

Lenny Kravitz-James Holloway

Terrence Howard-Howard

Robin Williams-President Dwight D. Eisenhower

James Marsden-President John F. Kennedy

Minka Kelly-First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy

Liev Schreiber-President Lyndon B. Johnson

John Cusack-President Richard Nixon

Alan Rickman-President Ronald Reagan

Jane Fonda-First Lady Nancy Reagan

Nelsan Ellis-Martin Luther King, Jr.

Mariah Carey-Hattie Pearl

David Banner-Earl Gaines

Vanessa Redgrave-Annabeth Westfall

Alex Pettyfer-Thomas Westfall

Clarence Williams III-Maynard

Directed by Lee Daniels

Forest Whitaker is White House butler Cecil Gaines, a silent witness during one of the most tumultuous periods in American history.

Note: Screened on Monday, August 5, 2013 at the Ziegfeld Theater (Red Carpet Premiere).

'History never looks like history when you are living through it,' wrote former Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare John W. Gardner in his 1968 book No Easy Victories. If Eugene Allen was still alive today, the irony of this statement would probably make him laugh because he literally did live through history. As a butler at the White House, Allen saw eight presidential administrations come and go, from Harry S. Truman to Ronald Reagan, and while his name might not be a mainstay in school textbooks, the fact that he bore witness to history being made from the most powerful address in the world is significant in and of itself. Now he's the subject of a major motion picture in "Lee Daniels' The Butler," set to be released on August 16. The confusing title makes the film sound like it's based on the life of the director's personal manservant but is actually the result of a frivolous legal squabble between The Weinstein Company and Warner Brothers. Apparently, Daniels' film shared the same name of a 1916 silent film, forcing Harvey Weinstein to change it to the possessory title it has now. As a director, Daniels has been largely hit-or-miss. 2005's "Shadowboxer" and last year's "The Paperboy" received mixed to negative reviews while 2009's "Precious" (which also ironically went through a title change), based on the novel Push by Sapphire, went on to achieve critical acclaim. "The Butler" (as it shall be called for the rest of this review) doesn't quite match "Precious" in terms of raw emotional power and occasionally stumbles with moments of over-sentimentalism, in addition to some strange casting choices, but the film remains a sincere portrait of one of the most tumultuous periods in American history thanks to Forest Whitaker's quiet, dignified performance.

Eight-year-old Cecil Gaines works alongside his family as sharecroppers in the cotton fields of Macon, Georgia in 1926 but when cruel landowner Thomas Westfall (Alex Pettyfer) rapes his mother Hattie (Mariah Carey) and murders his father Earl (David Banner) right before his eyes, the boy is taken in by Westfall matriarch Annabeth (Vanessa Redgrave), who trains Cecil as an in-house servant. To avoid suffering the same fate as his father, Cecil leaves the plantation once he turns fifteen. Forced to break into a bakery after going days without eating, he is found by Maynard (Clarence Williams III), who offers Cecil a job as a butler in the same store he broke into. Cecil (Forest Whitaker) eventually moves to Washington, D.C. and takes a position at an elite hotel, the Excelsior. He also meets his wife Gloria (Oprah Winfrey) while working there and has two children with her, Louis and Charlie. After being noticed by a White House administrator, Cecil lands the job of a lifetime in 1957 as a butler at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. His tenure at the White House allows him to witness history in the making every day as presidents come and go but trouble begins to brew at home when his eldest son Louis (David Oyelowo) decides to join the burgeoning civil rights movement against his wishes.

Loosely inspired by Wil Haygood's 2008 Washington Post article A Butler Well Served by This Election, director Lee Daniels' "The Butler" can at times be too heavy-handed and overly sentimental yet the film's heart and soul is never in doubt as you watch over eighty years of history unfold on-screen in two hours and twelve minutes. I'm glad that Eugene Allen's story is finally being told, even if it is heavily fictionalized. Written by Danny Strong (who won a Primetime Emmy for his work on 2012's "Game Change"), Cecil Gaines' childhood is largely shown in montage but the film's opening scenes, set in 1926 Georgia, immediately strike a chord with its matter-of-fact bluntness as you see his mother brutally raped (this is shown off-screen) and his father murdered with a gunshot to the head by the plantation's ruthless owner. The story moves quickly, glossing over Cecil's tutelage under Maynard and before you know it, he's already at the White House. It's here that Strong's screenplay takes an interesting dramatic turn as the plot divides in two, with one focusing on the domestic turmoil between Cecil and his estranged son Louis and the other serving as more of a condensed history lesson of how far America has come in terms race relations. You're essentially getting two movies in one here and sometimes the pacing can get bogged down as it jumps between them.

By far the strongest half of the story is the one involving Cecil's frustrations as a father as he tries to deal with his eldest son's burgeoning radicalism. Against his father's wishes, Louis decides to attend Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee and immediately joins the growing civil rights movement. Daniels doesn't shy away from the extreme racism that African Americans suffered during that era and there's a harrowing scene where Louis, along with his fellow classmates, are physically and verbally assaulted by white supremacists while they participate in a sit-in at a diner. In his eyes, Louis feels that his father is just perpetuating the status quo by remaining in a subservient position and Daniels plays on their conflict visually with a clever montage that shifts between Cecil going through his routine at the White House and his son getting arrested during a violent showdown at a sit-in. Fortunately, Louis slowly comes to understand the work ethic his father lives by when Martin Luther King, Jr. (Nelsan Ellis) eloquently explains that people like Cecil 'are subversive without even knowing it.' Cecil may not be an active participant in civil rights and his triumphs are small in scope (his most significant act is getting a raise for himself and his fellow butlers) but what makes his side of the story so affecting is the way this simple man reacts to the history being made around him.

Less successful is Cecil's interactions with the various presidents that he serves under during his thirty-year tenure at the White House (curiously, Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter are absent). This is when "The Butler" devolves into an exercise of mawkish over-sentimentalism. The most glaring issue here is the blatant stunt casting as the people look nothing like the real-life historical figures they've been chosen to play. Let's take Robin Williams' Dwight D. Eisenhower as an example. No matter how much make-up you lather on him, Robin Williams will still look like…Robin Williams. Every time a new president shows up, it takes you out of the film. James Marsden sounds like Mayor Quimby from "The Simpsons" as John F. Kennedy and John Cusack bears absolutely no resemblance to Richard Nixon. Liev Schreiber comes close as Lyndon B. Johnson and he has a funny scene where he's barking orders to members of his Cabinet while sitting on the toilet constipated. He then asks Cecil to hand him more prune juice. Another issue is the way the film insinuates that Cecil inspired the presidents he served to support integration and voting rights from just one conversation. This saintly portrayal clashes with the everyman tone from Cecil's domestic life.

With the exception of the awful miscasting of the various presidential figures that move in and out of the film, the performances for the rest of the cast remain uniformly excellent. Forest Whitaker's turn as Cecil Gaines probably won't earn him the same acclaim he received for his role as Ugandan dictator Idi Amin in 2006's "The Last King of Scotland" but his sincere and dignified performance goes a long way in smoothing out the film's more glaring flaws. Returning with her first on-screen acting role in fifteen years, Oprah Winfrey initially strikes an odd tone as Cecil's bored housewife Gloria, moving from outrageous camp to soap operatic melodrama yet to my surprise, her performance works and many of the film's more humorous moments are delivered by her. However, it is David Oyelowo who strikes the biggest chord as Cecil's estranged son Louis. Oyelowo captures the triumphs and hardships of the civil rights movement, to the point where he becomes the heart of Daniel's film. Rounding out the cast is Cuba Gooding, Jr. and Lenny Kravitz as two White House butlers who become Cecil's closest confidantes. The two deliver fun and engaging performances in their individual roles, especially Gooding, Jr.

To be released on August 16, 2013, "The Butler" has been receiving positive reviews and currently stands at 79% on Rotten Tomatoes. Whether it achieves the same level of success as 2011's "The Help" remains to be seen; however the film did receive a standing ovation during its world premiere. It should do reasonably well at the box office given its low production budget ($25 million) and adults have been neglected for the better part of the summer. Despite its over-sentimentality and off-putting casting choices, "The Butler" manages to rise above these flaws and serve as a reminder that we should never forget America's ugly past but more importantly, it asks us to celebrate the smallest triumphs because sometimes, they turn out to be the most important.

Final Rating: 3.5 out of 5

"Everything you are, and everything you have is because of that butler."