slumdog_millionaire_movie_poster[1]Slumdog Millionaire

Rating:  5/5

When a movie comes along that lives up to its hype, I’m pretty ecstatic.  And Slumdog Millionaire had a whole lot of hype.  The Academy Awards ended up awarding it the Oscar for Best Picture, and it’s easy to see why.  This movie hits on all cylinders:  a gripping plot, smart writing, good pacing, excellent acting, and wonderful cinematography.  Although it’s fundamentally a serious film, it has moments of comedy, many of which are all the more affecting given the subject matter of the film.

Jamal K. Malik (Dev Patel) is a contestant on the Indian version of “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire”, the famous quiz show.  He’s also a “slumdog”, a Muslim denizen of the slums of Mumbai, who works as a “chai wallah” (tea server) in a large call center for outsourced customer service and marketing.  After having advanced all the way to the final question, he’s interrogated/tortured by the police because no one believes that he could possibly know the answers to all the questions he was asked.

In a series of conversations between Jamal and a police inspector (Irrfan Khan) we discover just how Jamal knows the answers to the questions on the show, and in the process get a guided tour of the formative events of Jamal’s hard childhood, and understand the importance of the two most important people in his life — his brother Salim (Madhur Mittal), and the fellow slum refugee and childhood sweetheart Latika (Freida Pinto).

When you figure out the structure of the film, it seems perfect, and obvious in retrospect.  But even knowing the overall arc this film describes, it’s impossible to predict the twists and turns that Jamal and his brother encounter growing up.  Instead, you are treated to lushly-framed scenes of Indian slum life and a constant flow of struggles, setbacks, and growth.

Slumdog is unapologetically inspired by Bollywood cinema, with it’s “masala” style incorporating a mixture of tragedy, comedy, action, and romance.  Although there are no song-and-dance numbers within the movie itself, there is one during the credits that is very entertaining.  It’s hard for me to recommend this movie highly enough; it’s much like someone with a Western palate trying an Indian meal:  it’s not anything like you’d expect, but it’s very, very good.