There are two controversies attached to Slumdog Millionaire:- Director Danny Boyle exploited child artists of slums.
- Amitabh Bachchan comments on description of third world as dirty in film.
Nothing new every big project is associated with controversies and with success they get more publicity and more clicks.
But what we must look upon is the art of describing and showing the reality. I don't know about the book but one could not deny the masterpiece created by Danny Boyle and the magic of A R Rahman.
- Is it really possible to picturize the scenes taking all well trained child actors. Very difficult, as it requires real life hero's like Azharuddin(child Jamal) and Rubina(child Latika).
- Whether its unfair to show a particular class of society and there lifestyle to world when it is world largest slum.
Well I don't think so and believe that these are just the side affects of success.
Scenes of poverty and squalour may appear romantic to Westerners and to our snooty elite but for ordinary Indians they are nothing new. They are an everyday reality. However, one wonders what sort of mind can find such images aesthetically pleasing. Party-hopping socialites (for example, Shobhaa De after all her bombast of "enough is enough" after the Mumbai attack, went and watched a pirated copy!) who are distanced from such reality may find this film an "eye-opener" but for us it IS just poverty-porn. It IS just slum- voyeurism. The music/soundtrack and the technical quality is excellent but I think, overall, the film is unrealistic and over-rated because:
ReplyDelete1) The director seems to RELISH showing violence. Some of it (like the police-torture) is quite needless. And why was the boy arrested in the first place? On what charge? Was it realistic?
2) How can a boy growing up in slums speak such accented English? Even if one assumes that the language he actually uses to communicate with the game-show host and the police officer is Hindi (granting the director the creative license to use a language better suited for international audiences), there are 2 instances where it is stretched too far: (a) when the boy becomes a ‘guide’ for foreign tourists at the Taj Mahal & (b) when he becomes a substitute-operator at the call-centre.
3) When the boy uses his ‘lifeline’ during the game-show, his friend discovers that she has forgotten her mobile and has to run back for it. This is plain Bollywood masala! Did the director HAVE to make it so melodramatic?
4) How did the boy know who invented the revolver just by watching his brother use it?
How does his friend know about Benjamin Franklin?
5) “Darshan Do Ghanshyam” is NOT written by Surdas. It is written by Gopal Singh Nepali for the movie Narsi Bhagat (1957). This song is also credited as traditional and originally written by 15th century poet Narsi Mehta, whose life that film is based on.
6) After winning the game-show, the boy sits on the railway platform and nobody recognizes him! Considering the popularity of the show, is that realistic?
7) Two glaring omissions: To get invited to the show one has to answer several GK questions over phone or Internet. Even after making it to the show, a contestant can reach the hot-seat, only after qualifying through “fastest finger first”. All this is conveniently forgotten in the film.
8) And of course the greatest flaw in the storyline: programmes like 'Kaun Banega Crorepati' and 'Who Wants To Be A Millionaire' are NOT telecast live. As a result the entire structure of the film becomes unrealistic. For a film that boasts of being realistic such a flaw cannot be overlooked.
Due to all these flaws, “Slumdog Millionaire” is no better or worse than an average Bollywood masala film and the Academy will lose its credibility if it gives this film the Best Picture & Best Director awards.
Mr Sambit,
ReplyDeleteI think that your claims and supposed flaws on the movie is very uninformed. We are not out here to watch a documentary, but a movie, a fictional story in this case.
It does not matter whether or not it is believable (we have movies about aliens, love at first sight for God sakes!) It is about the experience that the film gives you, not its authenticity to real life.
The portrayal of the slums of India may be biased and that may be the only argument that you can have on this film.
You cannot pick on a fictional film and ask why, how and what. When you watch a movie or even read a fictional novel, you are needed to suspend your disbelief and go into the world of possibilities. You watch the movie for its entertainment value not of its authentic depictions of a society.
The film's editing, composition, filming and acting were superb. It did well in terms of telling a story through film. I don't think the Academy has any restriction on "film must be realistic, and must be able to happen in real life". I mean, get a grip please!