David O'ConnellSlumdog Millionaire
January 6th 2009 02:01
Danny Boyle’s visually stunning film may squander some of its dramatic potential on unsurprising, dubiously-tweaked melodrama but it’s still a thoroughly entertaining thrill ride through the highs and lows of an unlikely anti-hero’s life.
After improbably scooping the pool on India’s version of Who Wants to be a Millionaire, Jamal Malik (Dev Patel) is taken into custody and brutally mistreated by the suspicious policemen who attempt to beat and torture the truth out of him, assuming some form of cheating has been used to choose the correct answers.
Necessarily episodic in nature and condensed into a jump-starting, non-linear narrative, we watch the progress of Jamal’s life through fleeting glimpses relevant to the questions posed to him on the show. Are the keys to answering each question hidden in Jamal's colourful past? Or is he guilty of elaborate trickery?
More relevant are the mysteries of fate and the merging of destinies which is what Slumdog Millionaire is ultimately concerned with, interspersing drama and mystery with a fanciful love story.
Along the way there’s the struggle for supremacy between Jamal and Salim (Madhur Mittal), two brothers forced to grow up before their time in the Mumbai slums, and the rose that sits between them in the form of their third ‘muskateer’, Latika (Frieda Pinto) – threatening to split them apart as jealousy and lust cloud the equation. Though separated, these are lives destined to converge again.
There's also the dissection of good versus evil in the divergent paths of Jamal - the good-natured brother - and Salim, soon to become his polar opposite as an adult, unable to resist the influence of the slum’s criminal head, lured into that life and away from the ties of brotherhood.
Patel is a convincing and empathetic central figure, even when in startled mode before the television cameras, looking like a deer caught in oncoming headlights, whilst the luminescent Pinto easily convinces us as the object of Jamal’s desire to protect and save her from the clutches of those who would rather savor her as an exotic trophy.
The impressive score by A.R. Rahman, scattered between some occasionally out-of-place Indian source music, ramps up the drama and action in many scenes with a daring combination of acoustic and electronic sounds, whilst Anthony Dod Mantle’s exhilarating cinematography is peerless, the constantly changing angles reflective of the internal and external fluctuations of these characters’ lives. Consequently the film exudes an almost kaleidoscopic visual sense, with the sounds, smells, and vibrant colours of India translated onto the screen in both a stimulating and entertaining way.
Boyle has never made the same film twice, his work always worth watching; even if he has occasionally missed the mark - as with the incomprehensible meltdown of Sunshine – he always impresses with his vivid and daring cinematic technique. For Slumdog Millionaire he was ably assisted by Loveleen Tandan for the scenes shot in India.
Simon Beaufoy, best known as the writer of The Full Monty, adapted the screenplay from a novel by Vikas Swarup called Q and A. That Boyle manages to wring every last drop of dramatic tension out of the final questions on the TV show - an essentially predictable scenario - says a lot for his manipulative skills, and even if the conclusion is a conventional one and a little too neatly tied up with melodramatic touches, it still proves to be another impressive addition to his expanding body of work.
After improbably scooping the pool on India’s version of Who Wants to be a Millionaire, Jamal Malik (Dev Patel) is taken into custody and brutally mistreated by the suspicious policemen who attempt to beat and torture the truth out of him, assuming some form of cheating has been used to choose the correct answers.
Necessarily episodic in nature and condensed into a jump-starting, non-linear narrative, we watch the progress of Jamal’s life through fleeting glimpses relevant to the questions posed to him on the show. Are the keys to answering each question hidden in Jamal's colourful past? Or is he guilty of elaborate trickery?
More relevant are the mysteries of fate and the merging of destinies which is what Slumdog Millionaire is ultimately concerned with, interspersing drama and mystery with a fanciful love story.
Along the way there’s the struggle for supremacy between Jamal and Salim (Madhur Mittal), two brothers forced to grow up before their time in the Mumbai slums, and the rose that sits between them in the form of their third ‘muskateer’, Latika (Frieda Pinto) – threatening to split them apart as jealousy and lust cloud the equation. Though separated, these are lives destined to converge again.
There's also the dissection of good versus evil in the divergent paths of Jamal - the good-natured brother - and Salim, soon to become his polar opposite as an adult, unable to resist the influence of the slum’s criminal head, lured into that life and away from the ties of brotherhood.
Jamal (Dev Patel) with the game show host (Anil Kapoor)
Patel is a convincing and empathetic central figure, even when in startled mode before the television cameras, looking like a deer caught in oncoming headlights, whilst the luminescent Pinto easily convinces us as the object of Jamal’s desire to protect and save her from the clutches of those who would rather savor her as an exotic trophy.
The impressive score by A.R. Rahman, scattered between some occasionally out-of-place Indian source music, ramps up the drama and action in many scenes with a daring combination of acoustic and electronic sounds, whilst Anthony Dod Mantle’s exhilarating cinematography is peerless, the constantly changing angles reflective of the internal and external fluctuations of these characters’ lives. Consequently the film exudes an almost kaleidoscopic visual sense, with the sounds, smells, and vibrant colours of India translated onto the screen in both a stimulating and entertaining way.
Jamal with the beautiful Latika (Frieda Pinto)
Boyle has never made the same film twice, his work always worth watching; even if he has occasionally missed the mark - as with the incomprehensible meltdown of Sunshine – he always impresses with his vivid and daring cinematic technique. For Slumdog Millionaire he was ably assisted by Loveleen Tandan for the scenes shot in India.
Simon Beaufoy, best known as the writer of The Full Monty, adapted the screenplay from a novel by Vikas Swarup called Q and A. That Boyle manages to wring every last drop of dramatic tension out of the final questions on the TV show - an essentially predictable scenario - says a lot for his manipulative skills, and even if the conclusion is a conventional one and a little too neatly tied up with melodramatic touches, it still proves to be another impressive addition to his expanding body of work.
Director Danny Boyle
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Comment by atula
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Comment by Cheryl J
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Comment by David O'Connell
Screen Fanatic
Hi Cheryl, I hope you get to see it soon, it's very well made with a lot of rich, colourful touches that I'm sure you'd appreciate.
Comment by atula
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