Slumdog Millionaire

An unimaginable RollerCoaster ride from the squalor of a Mumbai slum to a completely believable realization of the most profound longing of all of us.Being an old gringo who has never had personal contact with Hindi folks or visited India, I got connected via Bollywood. I am a high end home audio professional and my first attraction, besides the stunning actresses, was the really artful make use of surround sound and the engaging musical arrangements. That said, I first chased my way through the make believe world of the musical romantic comedies. Searching for more, I ran into some of the real gritty and honest views of life in India. They can leave you emotionally drained with the full complement of guilt, sympathy and a profound respect for the strength of the Human spirit.This film is an amazing example of demonstrating the best and worst of what we can be. Nothing is held back. Against the vivd images of life in the squalor and horror of life in almost unlivable conditions, we are graphically shown the very best and worst of what we can be. We are reminded of the seemingly limitless optimism of children.You will find it very hard to avoid becoming completely immersed emotionally in this film. As gritty and horrifying as it becomes, the depth of character and spirit of selfless devotion will overshadow everything else.Just reviewing my emotional extremes as I took this ride, I am still amazed. When I watched it the fourth or fifth time I started looking for flaws in the characters and progress of the action or even the ending. A movie about making enough money to take you to a living Disneyland is never about the money or the Disneyland dream life that it would buy. That is just the common denominator carrot that draws you into the so much bigger story of a child's dreams and if you get a chance to step back from the torrent of emotion that you are assailed with, you get to see how dangerous the money and what it brings with it are. I guess I never really sat down and analyzed just how much this movie had to say or how much insight is revealed. Just stunning.

This film won several Oscars and deserved them all. It is a unique masterpiece that grabs the viewer on several levels: the story, the setting, the acting and the cinematography. SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE is the story of how Jamal, a young, uneducated man, from India's lowliest slums, working in the most menial of jobs, achieves unprecedented success as a contestant on "Who Wants to Be A Millionaire?" It seems impossible to believe that he would have the kind of knowledge to answer a wide assortment of questions that clearly would appear to be outside his scope of experience. But therein lies the brilliance of the film: how he knows the answers to each question is woven into the fabric of his life's experiences and told in flashback.Orphaned at a very young age when their mother is brutally murdered, Jamal and his older brother Salim, survive amidst trash dumps. Their lives are brutally harsh and made more so when they become ensnared by a professional gang of beggars, and later when they do what they must to eke out a living. Yet in each vignette of their lives something occurs that provides Jamal with the critical knowledge he uses later on the TV program. Threaded throughout his story is his undying passion for a little orphan girl, Latika, who he repeatedly loses and then finds only to lose her again.This is a story of the triumph of the human spirit. No matter how battered down and hopeless life appears, Jamal never gives up. An unforgettable movie that has already become an "essential".

Every American should watch this movie when they are old enough. I've seen poverty in Jamaica, Mexico, and Ethiopia. If you have never seen poverty, this is a REAL look at how most of the Earth's population lives. When we went to Ethiopia to pick up our adopted children, we were told that children were purposefully mutilated to help them be more efficient at begging, well, this movie goes there. Would you give money to those kids? If you do, you feed them. If you do, you feed the system that promotes destroying children. Tough call isn't it? ... What about the movie? It is a great plotline/story written at the high point of WWtbaMillionaire phenomenon around the world. From the depths of human filth and abuse, comes the story of three kids and how they overcome in the most unlikely way. I don't know if any other 'underdog' movie comes close, or should I say 'slumdog' movie? I bought the DVD to show to the World Religions class that I teach in a Lutheran high school. The kids are getting an education. I fast-forward through the scenes I know are too rough to show in school, but I can't show them a better movie to help them understand the Caste System, up close and personal.

Great movie release,great quality and superb performances from the lead actors. Movies you can enjoy watching again and again