The Butler (2013)

I watched this movie last night (after it came from Netflix.) I have to say that I didn't care for it. I understand (and agree with) the message behind the film, but don't think it portrayed that the way it could have. One main part of the story is the famous people (ie the US Presidents) that the butler - played by Forrest Whitaker - works for. To play a famous person that everyone has seen pictures of you have to look, sound and act like the person otherwise it is a waste. The only way these people look like Eisenhower, JFK, Johnson and Reagan is if you close one eye and squint with the other. I also do not like that Jane Fonda (Hanoi Jane) was given the role of Nancy Reagan.

This movie had a good basic storyline (with the differences in America from the 1920s-today both societal and personal) but it is supposed to be a film based on a real person and yet so many of his personal details were changed for no reason. He wasn't born in Georgia, but Virginia. His mother was raped by a white man. Also the real butler (Eugene Allen) only had one son and not two. These key changes completely change the life story of the real butler with that of the one in this movie. It is one thing to have him experience things that he may not have experienced in real life, but to change such fundamental aspects as his up-bringing and his family just limits the overall experience the movie-watcher gets as they get a false sense of real life (which is not what you want from a movie based on someone's real life.)