Slumdog Millionaire

I started hearing the buzz on this months ago. Then as the film gods would have it, we saw an early screening. To be blown away by a film is putting it mildly. This film proves why we go to the movies. It is a Shakespearean romantic tragedy with a modern spin that never once strays from the powerful storyline.

You will be grabbing your armrests as you experience Jamal's triumphs and tragedies and clapping your hands at the very end.

What are you doing still reading this? GO SEE THIS FILM!!


Wikipedia: "Slumdog Millionaire is a 2008 British drama film directed by Danny Boyle and written by Simon Beaufoy. Based on the book Q and A by Vikas Swarup, the film, shot and set in India, follows a young street beggar who appears on a game show and exceeds people's expectations, raising suspicions from the game show host and law enforcement."


Reception:

Todd McCarthy, writing for Variety, praised Simon Beaufoy's "intricate and cleverly structured script", cinematographer Anthony Dod Mantle's immersing camera work, and Chris Dickens's "breathless" editing. McCarthy concluded, "As drama and as a look at a country increasingly entering the world spotlight, Slumdog Millionaire is a vital piece of work by an outsider who’s clearly connected with the place."^[21]

Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times described it as "a Hollywood-style romantic melodrama that delivers major studio satisfactions in an ultra-modern way", and the "hard-to-resist 'Slumdog Millionaire,' with director Danny Boyle adding independent film touches to a story of star-crossed romance that the original Warner brothers would have embraced, shamelessly pulling out stops that you wouldn't think anyone would have the nerve to attempt anymore."^[22]

In The New York Times, Manohla Dargis calls the film "a modern fairy tale," a "sensory blowout," and "one of the most upbeat stories about living in hell imaginable." She concludes that "In the end, what gives me reluctant pause about this bright, cheery, hard-to-resist movie is that its joyfulness feels more like a filmmaker’s calculation than an honest cry from the heart about the human spirit." ^[23]