A trailer for a film called The Help has appeared online. It's a film which looks to a time in the sixties when America was moving forward with civil rights and a small town was still caught up in the old beliefs of their "help" being second class citizens.

Already it sounds like it's paving the way for a hard hitting drama, but no, the trailer spells out a light hearted romp through territory that was probably much tougher and dangerous for many involved, yet the trailer suggests Hollywood is making the events into a lighter feeling Freedom Writers.

The Help is based on the novel by Kathryn Stockett (Amazon.co.uk / Amazon.com) which tells the story of a college student returning to her hometown and intent on becoming a writer who is shocked at the way the "help" are still being treated. She sees her first writing project in their undervalued lives and finds one woman who is willing to talk to her about how she was treated.

Soon others from the black community are coming forward and revealing their stories to the young writer, and she weaves them together, and while the stories are shocking to the white community, a friendship is formed, barriers are broken, and...yes you know the story by now.

It leads with Emma Stone and co-stars Bryce Dallas Howard, Jessica Chastain, Allison Janney, Sissy Spacek, Viola Davis and David Oyelowo, a very good cast. Judging from those names I can only assume that this trailer isn't that representative of the film itself, or at least hope it isn't.

Here's the trailer for The Help which comes through Empire. What do you think?