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?".
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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.
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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.
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.
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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 ).
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.