Movie Review : Slumdog Millionaire

My rating: 3 out of 5 stars.

Although I have been watching promos of this movie since last 4 months, I never got around watching it until last night. After all, I had to see what all the buzz is about. Every now and then a low-budget movie comes around that no one has ever heard of which ends up winning several international awards. Slumdog Millionaire is one of those movies.

Slumdog is a brilliantly directed movie with a great screenplay. If you didn’t know, the movie is based on the novel ‘Q & A’ by Vikas Swarup and directed by Danny Boyle. I have never heard of either of these names. Neither have I heard of the main characters in the movie Dev Patel and Freida Pinto. But still, this movie will entertain you till the end.

In spite of being a common bollywood love-story ( a boy, a girl, a villain, struggling life from rags to riches and a cheesy love song at the end), Slumdog doesn’t have the typical non-sense masala that you see in most of the bollywood movies. Jamal Malik's life starts in the filthy slums of Mumbai along with his elder brother Saleem and a friend Latika. They go through a series of unfortunate events and eventually the lovers get separated. In order to get his love back, Jamal decides to go on the famous TV show; Kaun Bangea Cororepati (fine performance by the host Anil Kapoor) because he knows Latika likes to watch that show. That’s where Jamal gets surprise of his lifetime when he discovers that all the questions on the show are somehow connected to story of his life. As he cruises through the questions, everybody on the show including the host starts to doubt that how does this kid from the slums possibly know answers to all these questions. Irfan Khan plays a cop who interrogates Jamal because they all think he cheated. The end of the movie is predictable. A R Rehman’s magical music adds a desi flavor to the movie.

Had this movie been directed by an Indian director, I don’t think it would have achieved anywhere close to the success that it has achieved today. Directory Danny Boyle has done an excellent job in giving an international platform to this film. Personally, I think except the people directly involved with this project, nobody (I mean no Indians) deserve to beat their chest about the success of the movie.

The only reason I am giving it three stars because we have seen the slums and the love stories several times. I just want someone to make a movie about modern India. Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely don’t have problem in accepting the fact that such slums and child-abuse scandals still exists in India. That is a fact.

Go see this one. Not for kids due to some foul language.