Reviewing SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE

I am speechless, stunned and obviously mystified by David Boyle's narration of a movie based on the plot of the television game show Kaun Banega Crorepati or Who Wants To Be a Millionaire. Yes, one thing more- it has no Mr.Bachchan.

Very few films have left me stunned with their script, drama, romance, cinematography, background music, art direction and everything.

SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE to date it captures a slum boys' dreams and sets it to a pedestal of a coveted crown.

It surely is a movie that has shades of Mira Nair's SALAM BOMBAY, but this movie is set in 2008 and dealt so differently and brilliantly.

As a kid, I used to whistle in the streets across often collecting marbles, and play with my friends in rain. Some things change with the times, but the memories lingers somewhere, and the visuals depicted in Slumdog captured my childhood so well.

At no point of time, I was apprehensive that the characters Jamal and Salim would not make it big, but that's the beauty of the movie's screenplay.

Jamal rises to the hot seat of KBC front, and each answer in the KBC tells a story of his life. His age of innocence as a kid when he stays in a slum and overleaps in joy at the very mention of Amitabh Bachchan. His childhood love, Lalita stays afresh in his mind and inspite of the various odds and journeys, the love still lingers.

A touch of Bollywood masala, which Boyle dutifully doesn't miss for he knows that the Asian audience needs that cream.


Salim, Latika & Jamal are the three principal characters in the movie, and you are engulfed in these characters that the poverty and smugness of Mumbai lets you never down.

At no point in the movie, did I felt that the director was trying to humanise the slums of Mumbai. I felt Boyle narrated the story with a pinch of humor everywhere. That's why a character like Mahesh Manjrekar existed.

To me there are plenty of scenes that stands out,and the movie itself conveyed a messaged to me. It says at no point of your life, feel that your life is planned. Life is unpredictable to the core, but if you are confident and believe that you can chase your dreams by being honest and upright, no one can stop you. Pessimism never won a battle.

SLUMDOG is not a movie to be missed. Go and watch it with your loved ones. It will change a thing or two. Hats off!