ElaineEntwine a star-crossed childhood sweethearts story with the in-your-face gruelling life in Bombay-turns-Mumbai before the heroes reach the light at the end of the tunnel and you get Slumdog Millionaire.
Directed by English director and film producer, Danny Boyle, this movie has won 4 awards in the Golden Globes and 5 of the 6 awards nominated at the Critics’ Choice Awards. It also looks like a very strong contender for the Best Picture prize in the upcoming Oscars.
Based on the nominated novel Q and A by Vikas Swarup, Slumdog Millionaire revolves around the life of an 18-year-old boy from the slums of Mumbai, who is suspected of cheating in the Indian version of the popular television gameshow Who Wants to be a Millionaire?
It’s true that Jamal Malik (played by Dev Patel) is uneducated, and yet has moved further into the game that professionals and academics, but it’s also true that all the correct answers were actually based on his real life experiences.
With just 1 question away from winning the top haul of 20 million rupees, Jamal is arrested by the police for cheating in the game show. While held in custody by the police, Jamal is tortured by his interrogator into spilling how he knew every answer.
When the investigating officer realises that Jamal is unlikely to have cheated and had no intention of winning the money, he decides to let him continue with the game.
In the 2-hour long movie, multiple flashbacks of Jamal’s childhood memories are carefully weaved in, each accompanying the questions from the game show, illuminating the torrid conditions in the Indian city. It gets a little confusing at first, and the colours and sounds are screaming at you, but viewers soon realise that there is a meaning to every flashback and how it relates to the question.
Each Flashback Tells a Piece of Story
Flashbacks include graphically unforgettable ones such as Jamal willingly jumping into a pile of feces in order to obtain an autograph from his favourite Bollywood star Amitabh Bachchan when he got locked up in the makeshift toilet by his brother Salim (played by Madhur Mittal), to his mother being killed in a Hindu-Muslim riot and how the 2 brothers made friends with another orphan, Latika (played by Freida Pinto).
Just when you thought the lives of the 3 orphans are changed by a kind-hearted soul, Maman (played by Ankur Vikal), who brought them to a village filled with running children, the angel-in-disguise actually is training a syndicate of child beggars.
Throughout the movie, you get to see the lives of many poor people living in the slums of India, struck by poverty, riots and corruption among the law enforcement officials. Despite such living conditions, you get to see a glimpse of hope that the 3 actors cling onto during their childhood days where they would do anything to stay alive.
Other scenes also include how Jamal and Salim trying to earn a living by pretending to be tour guides at the Taj Mahal, pickpocketing and selling goods on trains, these kids could just be very successful businessmen if given the chance.
Fantastic Cast and Music
Kudos to the director and his crew for picking the right actors (all 3 different ages of the 3 leading actors) as they strangely look very much like one another. All of them played their roles convincingly. Jamal has a very sweet-natured looking face, while Salim looks very much like a gangster (which he turns out to be) and Latika, the beautiful doe-eyed orphaned girl.
Throughout the movie, it was hard to not take notice of the soundtrack, composed by A. R. Rahman, who said that Boyle hated sentimentality, which means no cello, which explains why all his music are very upbeat and edgy.
The movie ended with an epic cast-of-hundreds Bollywood-style dance, which nicely wrapped it up.
While many think that Slumdog Millionaire doesn’t portray Mumbai’s good side, that is, by showing all the gangster fights, seedy corruption and poverty, others think that watching this movie just, in fact, makes them want to visit the country even more than ever. This UrbanWire reviewer thinks that watching this movie has broadened her knowledge about India, but she would rather just observe such rich culture from the big screen.
UrbanWire gives Slumdog Millionaire 4 out of 5 stars.
Movie details
Release date: Feb 13
Language: English and Hindi
Rating: NC 16 (Some coarse language)
Genre: Drama
Timing: 120 mins
Starring: Dev Patel, Madhur Mittal, Freida Pinto
Directed by: Danny Boyle
Picture courtesy of Golden Village