(I felt so strongly about the movie 'Slumdog Millionaire' that cleverly plays with the harsh life in slums. There is nothing wrong with displaying the inhuman situation but I think a filmmaker has a duty to provide insights into social issues, not just look at poverty as if it was a tourist destination, as Danny Boyle does in 'Slumdog..'. I am also going to publish the article that I wrote on this subject for Nav Bharat Times. Please feel free to submit your comments on my thoughts.-Ashok, Saturday, January 17, 2008, New Jersey.)
Mumbai has captured a special place in the hearts and minds of people in the West, especially America. In November 2008, they watched nonstop coverage of some magnificent structures of Mumbai being attacked by terrorists for three nights and three days. For the last several years newspaper readers and television viewers have been bombarded with stories about India's economic growth. More recently Western people were rather taken for a surprise at the lover affair between the outgoing US President George W. Bush and India, an impoverished country turned into an important alliance in the war on terror. Bush rewarded India by pushing a nuclear treaty.
For decades India was better know for its elephants, cows, mystics and snake charmers who roamed the street of its cities. Not long after November 26, when India's most famous city Mumbai was targeted by terrorists, a dazzling movie, 'Slumdog Millionaire' was released in USA. Shot almost entirely on location in stinking slums of Mumbai, the film successfully caught the attention of middle class intellectuals and critics alike who were otherwise busy finding ways to deal with a sinking economy, unemployment and financial scandals. 'Slumdog Millionaire' won four Golden Globe awards for best dramatic film, screenplay, and musical score.
Based on a book by Vikas Swarup the movie traces the life of slum kid who, conquering all odds against him, grows to appear in a popular game show designed after the American TV show 'Who Wants to be a Millionaire?' The protagonist Jamal, though not an example of brilliance in spite of his poverty and misery, answers all questions in the quiz show to become a winner after the whole country throws its moral support behind him.
The movies brilliantly captured the cruel life of the downtrodden in urban India. It successfully creates sympathy for slum dwellers who were otherwise grossly neglected in a society where middle class tremendously prospered after the country adopted a free market economy in the Nineties. The economic miracle of India, however, has not reached the bottom of the society as reflected in the struggle of slum dwellers in the movie.
It is not difficult to notice the reason behind accolades and laurel won by 'Slumdog' in the West. This is not the first time films based on poverty were loved by the Western audiences who are used to identify India with poverty and cows. In the Sixties and Seventies Satyajit Ray's classics, such as, 'Apur Sansar' won accolades in European film festival circuits while Indian commercial cinema that always portrayed the victory of poverty over wealth, honesty over crookedness in its own crude formulas, vehemently protested against the attitudes of critics to ridicule them for being escapists. However, even Satyjit Roy's artistic portrayal of rural India was never recognized by the Oscars or Golden Globes of Hollywood until his final days. An Oscar was awarded to Ray for his lifetime achievement that he accepted from his hospital bed.
'Slumdog' is a poor and rough treatment of poverty. It looks at the harsh and cruel life in slums without any feelings. An emotionless treatment on screen appears to be selling the wretchedness of poor to the Western mindset so that the audience got some fun sitting in a theater. Unlike Satyajit Ray or Shyam Benegal of India or even Fellini of Italy, the movie never desires to look at the reasons behind those who have been left behind in a country that sat conveniently in the political and economic framework of US policies.
The British filmmaker Danny Boyle who is known for his talent to bring laughter amidst tragedy, celebrates the success of his movie that sells poverty and misery to entertain the West, even though it was made by a majority of its Indian case and crew, whose characters speak Hindi and dance at the tune of celebrated Indian music director A. R. Rahman.
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