Slumdog Millionaire (2008)
Directed by Danny Boyle
A teenager reflects on his life after being accused of cheating on the Indian version of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?".
23 connections found
View:
23 films that influenced Slumdog Millionaire
What critics say influenced Slumdog Millionaire
“Slumdog” is every bit as stylized as Mr. Boyle’s early works, and the film’s theme and exotic Mumbai locale undoubtedly invite comparisons to “City of God.” Adapted from a Vikas Swarup novel by “The Full Monty” scribe Simon Beaufoy, “Slumdog” adopts a zigzagging, time-jumping narrative that lends itself to Mr. Boyle’s over-the-top treatment.
He combines the suspense of a game show with the vision and energy of "City of God" and never stops sprinting.”
Stylistically, Slumdog Millionaire explodes off the screen with a frenetic energy I haven’t seen since Fernando Meirelles’ City of God.
Like Fernando Meirelles' City of God, Slumdog Millionaire is at times guilty of aestheticizing the poverty that it seeks to critique.
Boyle's modern-day fairy tale -- part " City of God , " part " Forest Gump " -- is just that wonderful, that joyous.
It sometimes has a hallucinogenic feel, like All That Jazz (1979), but the thrilling energy of a Bollywood romance comes through in the end, matched with some D.W. Griffith-style last-minute races, and we're hooked.
It's interesting to note that despite worldwide popularity, the quiz-show format has seldom made it to the screen apart from Richard Whorf?s delicious 1950 send-up, Champagne for Caesar, and the 1994 Robert Redford Quiz Show.
The film is essentially It's a Wonderful Life as re-imagined in that great SNL skit where George Bailey gets everything coming to him and beats the ever-living shit out of Mr. Potter upon retrieving the stolen money.
Advertisement
But "Slumdog Millionaire" is, finally, a classic tale of adventure and survival - adapted by Simon Beaufoy from a novel by Vikas Swarup - and is reminiscent of the underappreciated "Undertow," David Gordon Green's film about brothers in jeopardy.
It's interesting to note that despite worldwide popularity, the quiz-show format has seldom made it to the screen apart from Richard Whorf?s delicious 1950 send-up, Champagne for Caesar, and the 1994 Robert Redford Quiz Show.
Though the premise of Jamal's personal connection to every question is sometimes too much of a stretch -- this feels a little like "Forrest Gump" meets "Quiz Show" -- director Danny Boyle's in complete control of the material and his largely inexperienced young actors.
This hard-edged but vibrant and affecting drama is assembled with social concern, emotional depth, dramatic urgency and an infectious energy by Boyle, the director of Trainspotting and 28 Days Later , and is propelled by an exuberant music soundtrack all the way to a rousing, unforgettable finale.
Slumdog Millionaire combines (and outdoes) the style and energy of Boyle’s Trainspotting with the tenderness, sentimentality and accessibility of his overlooked family film, Millions.
Running is a constant motif in Slumdog Millionaire - and the element most reminiscent of Boyle's breakthrough film, Trainspotting.
Boyle reprises some of the bits that made him famous in Trainspotting—a police foot chase and a way-more-septic version of "The Worst Toilet in Scotland" gag.
It's an epic love story, cat and mouse thriller, social meditation and quiz show all harnessed into one emotionally and visually powerful treat by Trainspotting director Danny Boyle and The Full Monty writer Simon Beaufoy.
Many familiar with Danny Boyle only through his best-known films, Trainspotting and 28 Days Later, would be tempted to call Slumdog Millionaire a departure.
Danny Boyle, who impressed us immensely with the spiritual riches of Millions, has made another extraordinary movie that takes us to places we have never been.
No doubt someone's already formulated the argument that it's just a harmless allegory of one illiterate urchin's predestined rise (Boyle reprises his own repugnant Millions in that sense), but a closing credits sequence that hijacks Bollywood's musical extravaganza with the entire cast of extras suggests otherwise.
Slumdog Millionaire combines (and outdoes) the style and energy of Boyle’s Trainspotting with the tenderness, sentimentality and accessibility of his overlooked family film, Millions.
Danny Boyle ("Millions," "Sunshine"), who codirects with Loveleen Tandan, gives us a harsh dose of just what Jamal's life has been like when his unproven cheating on a game show results in questioning administered with waterboarding, electric shocks and stress positioning(!).
Directed by Danny Boyle, who once again ("Millions") goes straight to the heart, "Slumdog Millionaire" is a moving journey of life and love.
Directed by Danny Boyle (Millions, Sunshine), Slumdog Millionaire uses the questions and answers of Jamal’s game-show appearance as a hook to illuminate the tribulations of his hardscrabble life and the teeming, tumultuous city he lives in, but also to set the stage for a turning point that’s less about money than about love.
Boyle has always been one of the most eclectic directors, skipping from black comedy to sci-fi to horror; one of the most erratic, too, capable of not only "Shallow Grave" or "28 Days Later," but "The Beach" and "A Life Less Ordinary."
But his total feature filmography runs the gamut, and so this deceptively simple-sounding story of a street kid from India who finds himself on the cusp of winning big on Kaun Banega Crorepati (the country's version of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire) doesn't seem so odd in the midst of eclectic fare such as Sunshine, Shallow Grave , The Beach , A Life Less Ordinary , and (especially) Millions.
A distrust of money pervades Boyle's work, from his gruesome 1994 debut Shallow Grave, about the trouble that arises from the discovery of ill-gotten swag, to his recent children's adventure Millions, about the trouble that arises from . . .
Boyle launched his feature career with such energetic, scabrously observed movies as Shallow Grave and Trainspotting, later veering toward speculative genre twists in 28 Days Later and Sunshine.
Boyle, who has consistently impressed me with flicks like Trainspotting , 28 Days Later and Sunshine , deserves plenty of praise for his work, but I don't think it ranks next to any of the movies I just listed -- or even his debut gem, Shallow Grave .
As it happens, the 52-year-old Mr. Boyle has displayed a flair for noirishly horrific narratives ever since his striking film debut in 1995 with Shallow Grave, a marvelously well-acted saga of treachery and betrayal among three Scottish housemates of both genders who come into the sudden possession of a hoard of cash.
Then came a minor setback in 1997 with a kidnap-melodrama A Life Less Ordinary and a major setback in 2000 with a badly misfiring post-Titanic Leonardo DiCaprio vehicle, The Beach, shot in Thailand.
But his total feature filmography runs the gamut, and so this deceptively simple-sounding story of a street kid from India who finds himself on the cusp of winning big on Kaun Banega Crorepati (the country's version of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire) doesn't seem so odd in the midst of eclectic fare such as Sunshine, Shallow Grave , The Beach , A Life Less Ordinary , and (especially) Millions.
That sort of hyped-up aesthetic can quickly turn wearying, as it has in several of Boyle’s less successful ventures (including Shallow Grave and the duly forgotten A Life Less Ordinary); but here it is a fount of renewable energy.
Like Jamal, Boyle seems to have unwittingly prepared for this moment his entire life: establishing a singular oeuvre with his 1996 breakthrough Trainspotting, stylishly failing with The Beach and A Life Less Ordinary, then reinventing genres with 28 Days Later, Sunshine and Millions.
It’s a memory-narrated structure that superficially recalls that of The Usual Suspects .
"Slumdog Millionaire" is "The Usual Suspects" meets "It’s a Wonderful Life," with a strong dose of 21st century Charles Dickens.
The interrogation episodes bristle with the psychological gamesmanship of The Usual Suspects, and the bits from the televised broadcast thrill like a live sports event.
Advertisement
This seemingly unlikely project proves to be a most snug fit for Boyle's unique sensibilities: his florid visual imagination, his skill with young actors, his oft-repeated concern with money, and his attention to detail (the huge Bolly-phile that I am, I was impressed with the nods to real-life KBC hosts Amitabh Bachchan and--very subtly--Shahrukh Khan, via the use of a song from his 2006 remake of the Bachchan starrer Don ).
“Slumdog” is every bit as stylized as Mr. Boyle’s early works, and the film’s theme and exotic Mumbai locale undoubtedly invite comparisons to “City of God.” Adapted from a Vikas Swarup novel by “The Full Monty” scribe Simon Beaufoy, “Slumdog” adopts a zigzagging, time-jumping narrative that lends itself to Mr. Boyle’s over-the-top treatment.
In the brilliantly structured screenplay by Simon Beaufoy (“The Full Monty”), this summons forth a remarkable series of memories from Jamal, going all the way back to his childhood when his mother is killed in a religious riot.
It's an epic love story, cat and mouse thriller, social meditation and quiz show all harnessed into one emotionally and visually powerful treat by Trainspotting director Danny Boyle and The Full Monty writer Simon Beaufoy.
This hugely popular festival favorite (Audience Winner Toronto 2008) is sure to become a great crowd pleaser, dealing as it does with a David vs. Goliath motivated by love, but by its very conceit - that Jamal is able to answer tricky questions because of his experiences over a hardscrabble childhood - its script (Simon Beaufoy, "The Full Monty," "Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day") cannot help but be contrived, everything rigged beyond the possibilities of coincidence.
In the artfully plotted screenplay by Simon Beaufoy, formerly best known for writing The Full Monty , Jamal's explanations prove "bizarrely plausible", as one character describes them, and the movie exerts such a compelling hold that it defies cynicism.
Adapted by Simon Beaufoy ("The Full Monty") from the novel, Q & A by Vikas Swarup, "Slumdog Millionaire" carefully weaves multiple storylines and timelines together with breakneck speed.