“Hard times….Hard Times…..come again no more!”
The game show “Who Wants to be a Millionaire” burst onto the scene with unparalleled popularity in the early part of the new millennium. The concept was both simple and incredible. A multiple-choice question and answer session with the chance at winning a million dollars! Regis sopped up the fame while purists like Trebek scoffed at the blasphemy.
In America, the “lottery” mentality pushed Millionaire to ratings bliss. Work? Okay, but when I hit the big game I am going to buy this and that and this. It is mindless escapism for some and a sorry prayer for others. In the world of Jamal Malik, “Millionaire” is the only way out of a hardscrabble existence scorched on the streets of Mumbai (aaahhh but it will always be Bombay to me).
A slum dog, it turns out, is a derogatory term for an Indian street kid. Jamal and his brother Salim are just that. The story is told in reverse as Jamal is on the cusp of winning a million dollars on India’s version of Millionaire. The host of the show (a character as slimy and fun to watch as any villain in recent memory) is convinced that Jamal is cheating and sets him up for a round’ midnight interrogation the night before the big question is to be answered. While the entire country is championing Jamal, he must answer his accusers.
During the interrogation, Jamal is forced to explain to the police how it is that he knew each and every answer that he had given on the show. This is a brilliant vehicle for story telling and done here in four-star fashion.
The flash back interrogation allows Jamal to tell his grim tale of survival and sorrow. We learn that Jamal and Salim are survivors in the truest sense of the word. The two are bound by blood and have seen more devastation and loss by the age of sixteen than anyone should see in ten life times. From religious motivated attacks that leave he and his brother orphans, to falling into the clutches of a sadistic Fagan-type character, Jamal has only his brother and Latika (his one true love) to keep him company (and alive).
The colors used in this movie are spectacular as they somehow find equilibrium between the depressed existence in the slums of Mumbai marked by browns and grays and the bright yellows and greens of a dream world. India is seen at once as a place of great possibility and sweeping despair. The directing is done in quick shot fashion that could be described as MTV era but is too effective to be pigeon holed.
The magic of Slum Dog is that, after all the trials and suffering Jamal endures to earn the right to answer the final question, it really doesn’t matter whether he gets it right or not. His survival is his reward.
Slum Dog reinforces the notion that what we go through is who we are and that our pasts cannot be forgotten. When the final scene plays out, Jamal hears a voice that he thought he would never hear again. It is a voice that is more important to Jamal than all the money and fame the world could offer. We should all be so rich.
DMC
