Slumdog Millionaire is a movie that could only have been made by somebody not from India. In this case Danny Boyle; a Westerner. Knives are being sharpened. Even the great Bollywood icon Amitabh Bachnan has thrown his empty-headed two punches into the fray:
'If Slumdog Millionaire projects India as a third-world, dirty, underbelly developing nation and causes pain and disgust among nationalists and patriots, let it be known that a murky underbelly exists and thrives even in the most developed nations,' he bellowed. 'It's just that the Slumdog Millionaire idea, authored by an Indian and conceived and cinematically put together by a westerner, gets creative global recognition,' he added.
So whats's going on here? Why the indignation and criticism? No doubt Bachnan and fellow Bollywood no-talents (have you seen Bachnan's performance of King Lear?) are riled (and slightly jealous) that the best film made about India in recent times was made by a Westerner (a white man: Gorah). But is the criticism justified? Would the film have been as well feted if it had been made by an Indian?
I don't know, perhaps there is an element of studios backing well known Directors (who wouldn't after all it's all about economics) but the bitter truth is that Slumdog Millionaire with it's 'true-to-life' portrayal of India's poverty-stricken underbelly could only have been made by an foreigner or ferengi. Bollywood producers, fixated with making 'feel-good-high calorie-popcorn-fillers' are woefully blind in seeing India for what it is. In Mumbai alone, 2.6 million children live on the street or in slums, and 400,000 work in prostitution. But these people are absent from mainstream Bollywood cinema (trust me I've seen it). Bachchan's blinkered comments prove how hopelessly blind he and most of Bollywood are to the reality of India and how wholly incapable they are of making films that can address it. Instead, they produce worthless trash like Jaane Tu, Rock On!! and Love Story 2050, full of affluent young Indians desperately, and mostly idiotically, trying to look cool, modern and Western.
Slumdog Millionaire is based on the novel 'Q&A' by Vikas Swarup. Vikas loves his country as much as anyone and did it the service of telling its truth with great warmth and humanity. And Danny Boyle's film continues in precisely the same vein. His innovative brilliance, fresh perspective and foreign money was vital. As an outsider, he saw the truth that middle-class Indians are too often inured to: that countless people exist in conditions close to hell yet maintain a breath-taking exuberance, dignity and decency. These people embody the tremendous spirit and strength of India and its civilisation. They deserve the attention of its film-makers. I have no doubt that Slumdog Millionaire will encourage many more honest films to be produced in India. But Bachnan et al should be ashamed that it took a foreigner like Danny Boyle to show India how to do it.
The film looks gorgeous. Danny Boyle adeptly uses wide-angle cameras and places them at wonderful angles to get startling shots. The camera is placed at feet level, it is angled, it is twisted, we get birds-eye-views of the slums and much of the filming takes place at sunrise or sunset. Every frame in the movie is a foto-graf in the making! When you watch the movie pay attention to the camera angles and their placement and you'll see what I'm talking about. The music complements the pumped-up visuals well and is composed by A.R Rahman. Being visually attuned I was more drawn to the imagery of India. The Taj Mahal, the slums, the dhobis, the streets, the crowds, smells, the hugger-bugger. It's all there. Regardless of the visceral reality it portrays it still manages to remain a feel-good movie at heart. How does it do this? How do you film filth and poverty and desperation and still be feel good? You film with a heart and soul. Through your characters and plot you show you care. And this film does this. On a slight negative I wasn't wholly convinced by the truth of the love interest between the two protagonists. Their love felt too facile and plastic for me.
More then anything else the movie excels on a visual level and good ole plain story telling. Go see it. (4/5 stars!)
