Slumdog Millionaire (2008)

Directed by: Danny Boyle, Loveleen Tandan | 120 minutes | drama, romance, crime | Actors: Dev Patel, Anil Kapoor, Irrfan Khan, Madhur Mittal, Freida Pinto, Saurabh Shukla, Rajendranath Zutshi, Jeneva Talwar, Azharuddin Mohammed Ismail, Ayush Mahesh Khedekar, Sunil Kumar Agrawal, Jira Banjara, Sheikh Wali, Mahesh Manjrekar, Sanchita, Himanshu Tyagi, Sharib Hashmi

‘Slumdog Millionaire’ is an action-packed film, sentimental and realistic at the same time, and in this way manages to evoke many emotions. The film is a modern, contemporary love fairy tale in the slums of India, filmed in a Bollywood setting.

The story centers around Jamal, a child from the slums, and his older brother Salim. Jamal participates in a TV quiz ‘Who wants to be a Millionaire’. The film begins as Jamal reaches the final of the TV show ‘Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?’. Jamal’s life story is told in the form of flashbacks. Each answer to a quiz question also shows why he knew this answer. Jamal eventually gets through to the last round of the quiz: it’s not about the big money he can win with it, but he hopes to find his childhood sweetheart Latika. He knows that she is a loyal viewer. Will they be able to reach each other?

In the opening scenes of the film, Jamal is interrogated by the police. How can this simple tea boy know the tough answers to the quiz questions? There must be deception involved! In the following scenes we see little boys fleeing from the police. They played cricket in a strictly forbidden place. That looks harmless, but in this setup their flight from the police leads the viewer directly to the harsh conditions under which they live in the slums of Mumbai. The life story of Jamal that is then told is standing right from the start.

Religious riots between Muslims and Hindus force the young orphans to flee. They then meet a young girl, Latika. Jamal takes care of her as young as he is. Here lies the breeding ground and backbone for their later life and with it the film story. They soon come into contact with a man who apparently wants to take care of them with good intentions. However, it turns out that he has nefarious intentions. He runs a gang of beggars and the children are forced to beg for him under threat of abuse. Here in the story there is a clear reference to the figure of Fagin in the stories of Charles Dickens. Jamal, Salim and Latika manage to escape, but Latika is caught again by the gang leader. After that they lose sight of each other for years. In a whirlwind way, through Jamal’s answers to the quiz questions, the film tells the story of his life, his ongoing search for Latika and many other events.

It is a great find to tell the story through the questions and the answers in the quiz. In this way eighteen years of his life are sketched, but also the changes in modern India are shown. The slums where he first lived are completely demolished and blocks of luxurious apartments are created. Modern means of communication are advancing and Western TV programs such as ‘Who wants to be a Millionaire’ are extremely popular and widely watched.

Some form of criticism applies to the fact that the majority of the characters are portrayed rather sketchily: the bad villains, the great heroes and his childhood sweetheart Latika, who is always waiting for him. This kind of almost one-dimensional stereotypes emphasizes the fairytale character of the film, but does not really detract from the whole.

‘Slumdog Millionaire’ has mainly become a Western film, filmed in Hollywood style. For example, we see Bollywood pull back in the dance scene at the end of the film. The story is a convincing swinging love story but certainly not sugary and has a lot of dynamics. The locations are visually impressive with superb camera work. The images of the slums are impressively realistic, but not repulsive. There too, society is buzzing despite the tragedy of living conditions. The editing is nice and fast, resulting in a well-running film story for a wide audience, where the soundtrack adds just that little bit extra. A whirlwind story with a lot of momentum.