Two really big news items from the 2009 Oscars. Mickey Rourke was not able to break the Spirit Awards jinx and Slumdog Millionaire won in eight of the ten categories that it was nominated in. “Slumdog” means an underdog from the slums and the story is about one such underdog striking it super rich in a game show. The film is based in India with a largely Indian cast. It has been directed by British director Danny Boyle.
The film is one of the few to have pleased the critics and the masses as well. It has garnered awards by the bucketful including four Golden Globes and seven BAFTA awards. However, this “rags-to-rajah” saga has not gone down well with everybody in India. There is a feeling that the film exploits India’s image of a poor third-world nation that has not moved very far from fakirs and elephants on the street.
My personal feeling is that every few decades the Oscar committee gets this twitch to upend the Oscars basket on a single film. Hardly any of the adjectives used by critics used to praise the film are objective enough to be understood by the lay person. Danny Boyle knows the trick to make it click- and trick it is. Art to be exalted with eight Oscars…not everybody thinks so.
The film has clearly been made with a Western audience in mind and not the billion-plus movie goers in India.
Comments
Julie
February 26th, 2009 - 7:53:34 AM
I wonder what it is about the movie that the Indian people object to? There are so many movies in the US about the slums/ghetto/NYC back-alleys/bars/strip clubs/casinos. We as a nation aren't overly sensitive about the darker parts of society, instead they fascinate and frighten us on the big screen. Was it the english language speaking? Or was it really the portrayal of India as a third world country that bothered those in India? India is third world. I remember following the blog of a doctor friend who traveled there and was confronted with humans defecating in public. I thought the movie was good about not showing India in a bad light. Sure, it showed the lower class citizens in their struggle, but it stayed away from characteristics of the emerging nation that would have been most off putting. Anyone agree with me? I loved the movie, and I was so glad it won all those awards. While there have been more deserving films in the history of Oscar, none of the ones up against Slumdog were more deserving.
1