To somehow update myself as the Academy hands the Oscars days from now, I watched one of the frontrunners: Slumdog Millionaire. This is one of the slowburn movies from late last year but it quickly caught fire as awards season came, even stealing the Golden Globe Best Picture win from surefire/big-production/made-for-award masterpiece The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.
Slumdog Millionaire is a story of how a common, uneducated guy from the Mumbai slums managed to win the 20-million jackpot prize in the Indian Who Wants To Be A Millionaire. Many saw this as a one-in-a-million hoax (read: cheating), because even the most academic contestant never went this far. The movie poses a very serious question about destiny. Did the hands of Fate wrote Jamal Malik's story and conspired to bring him to this highly verbatim “fortune”?
Looking beyond its syrupy love story, the movie makes us believe that our individual destiny is indeed written. However, it also brings forward another view: that NOTHING in life is COINCIDENCE. As much as we try to forget the beauty and tragedy of the past, we are all products of our past. Remember the advice people tell us when something unfortunate happens? That things happen for a reason. The movie explains this in full circle, showing us the logic and sense of how Jamal seems to know (or not know...I am not telling) the answer to the game’s questions.
Slumdog Millionaire also depicts a very Indian principle: KARMA...both the good and the bad kind. How, in the end, we get what we deserve.
I heard that Indians did not take this movie well, both in terms of personal bias and box office returns. First reason is that it depicts the more dismal side of Indian life (slums), a realism they do not want to see on the big screen. They might have a point. Being exposed to third-world reality, I was still shocked at the horrific scenes in the movie (there was even the literal falling on shit). The movie overcompensates in irony; because outside of its beautiful story, it shows India in really bad light.
Second is that the movie lacked a big Bollywood star. I really wouldn’t know because I am not a fan of Bollywood. But I think the producers made a wise move in casting relative unknowns. This renders the movie more realistic and you gravitate towards the “commonness” of the actors and their characters.
While I enjoyed the movie and it does have a heart in its brilliant story, I was more satisfied (both aesthetically and emotionally) with The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. Truth to tell, watching Slumdog was like watching a local indie flick (think a former-tambay from Tondo winning Pilipinas, GKNB). So I can empathize with how the Indians feel for this movie. I will go as far as saying that, in the third-world context, the movie offers nothing of substance. Just a make-believe fantasy story.
And that dancing of the actors in the end?! Que horror! I only see that in B-rated local comedies starring TVJ.
This may be the most acclaimed Indian-inspired movie in world film history. It milks realism to its core, sprinkling it with a dash of mush. This is something we have seen before, in the small tube even. But the world (outside India) seems to take heed and notice.
Well, that is probably the movie's destiny (pun intended).