Lee Daniels’ The Butler is an earnest, well-intentioned movie. In fact, one would be hard pressed to find a film with a better heart. Unfortunately, it is content to let history be the story rather than use the past as a canvas for saying something substantive.
Based on a true story and set across several decades of the 20th century, The Butler follows Cecil Gaines, White House butler for every U.S. president from Eisenhower to Reagan. The son of black cotton plantation workers, Gaines is brought into the manor of his parents’ “employer” to work in the house. The Butler not only has an earnest heart, it also has an honest one. Black people suffered unspeakable shame, and writer Danny Strong and director Daniels don’t shy away from harsh words in service to political correctness. If we’re going to tell these stories, we should tell them as though we are baring our souls, ugly history and all.
Circumstances bring Gaines to the White House, where he’s told to serve, and to hear and say nothing. As he enters the Oval Office to bring Eisenhower and two other men tea during his first errand as a butler, he overhears the president musing about sending federal troops to Little Rock, Ark., where the governor is refusing to integrate the schools.
This scene sets up the pattern for the rest of the movie: Gaines will bear witness to events in civil rights history while serving the political leaders who had a hand in making it happen. He gains the trust of these men, who speak candidly and casually to him, as though he’s a trusted confidant.
Gaines was actually every common man and woman who lived during those times, but were only able to stand by and watched the future take shape.
Gaines was a family man, but the demands of his work kept him away from home, where his wife became an alcoholic and had an affair, and where his sons grew up not knowing their dad.
My biggest issue with The Butler has to do with the oldest son, Louis, nicely played by David Oyelowo. To give viewers an insider’s look at the civil rights movement, Strong and Daniels follow Louis to Fisk University in Nashville, Tenn., where he becomes a part of the sit-ins. From there, they trace his journey to the Black Panthers and his subsequent stab at politics. It also follows his romantic relationship with another activist.
Every time the movie leaves Gaines to catch up on Louis, it ceases to be The Butler and becomes The Butler’s Son. Consequently, and curiously, I didn’t connect with Gaines as a character. Forest Whitaker’s performance is the kind you’d expect from an actor of his brilliance, but the movie holds Gaines at bay. He ostracizes his son, struggles to reconnect with this wife, and dutifully serves tea without opening his mouth, but other than that, he’s an observer. I never felt as though I got to know him.
The story of African Americans and of the civil rights movement cannot be told too often, for every generation must remember. To that end, The Butler finds a new viewpoint for telling a familiar story. However, simply retelling the story isn’t enough; history must resonate thematically, and for all of its earnestness, The Butler doesn’t ring with meaning.
It does, however, entertain, especially with regard to the inspired casting of U.S. presidents. If I had to pick a favorite, it would be a tie between John Cusack as an unpleasant, egotistical, and self-centered Nixon, and Liev Schtreiber as LBJ. The scene with LBJ sitting on the toilet, doing his business, while complaining to his advisors, all while Gaines stands at attention at the open bathroom door, ready to provide the president with a warm towel, is alone worth the price of admission.
I also loved the casting of Oprah Winfrey as Gaines’ wife. It was a risk, given Winfrey’s age, but she pulls off the young Gloria well, and delivers a performance that beats in tandem with the movie’s heart.
Despite a lack of a thematic core, or anything new to say, The Butler is worth seeing. The cast is wonderful, the writing in individual scenes is sharp as a tack, and remembering this history so we don’t repeat it in any way, shape or form is important.
Two-and-a-half stars out of four. Rated PG-13 for violence, language, sexual material, thematic elements and smoking.