At the dawn of the civil rights movement, three Mississippi women are about to take one extraordinary step. Twenty-two-year-old Skeeter has just returned home after graduating from Ole Miss and her mother won’t be happy till she finds a husband. Aibileen, a wise African-American maid and caretaker suffers after the loss of her own child. And Minny, Aibileen's sassy best friend, struggles to find and hold a job. Seemingly as different from one another as can be, these women will nonetheless come together for a clandestine project that will put them all at risk.