A grim fairy tale with bursts of originality and beautiful visuals.

Rating: 8/10 (28 November 2008)

A director like Danny Boyle, who gave us the sickeningly tragic comedy "Trainspotting" and the more insane "A life less ordinary" (which for some equally insane reason, I loved), and of course, "The Beach", takes up a subject closer to my home country; Without doubt, I am intrigued. Also, given Boyle's penchant for seeing humor in sadness and pain, I wonder even before I step into to watch the movie, if he will present a slightly harsher version of the (under?)developing country India is.
Surprisingly, Danny Boyle has done a great job of putting together the glimpses of life in the slums, an element that the richer Indian has almost developed an invisible eye to. We know these issues exist, but it takes a movie like Salaam Bombay or in this case, Slum dog Millionaire for us to realize that this is exactly what the city holds in its slums, despite all the fame and glamor of Bollywood and the moonlighted houses at Harbour Road.
The movie is technically strong, visually appealing and bristles with the sort of innocence that only young artists seem to bring out so finely. The background score by A.R. Rahman, is simply fantastic and coordinates so beautifully with all the chase sequences in the movie (there are plenty). Parts of the movie, with their rich color and the harsh truths behind them appealed to me as brilliantly unique and brashly artistic. The cinematography and editing blossomed with originality.
The script however, was anything but unique. I tried to give it the benefit of doubt and think of it as a sort of crude fairytale version of live, but the harsh realism was too much in contrast with some of the prolonged displays of love, which neither Dev Patel or "girl with non Indian name and a shot to fame with no real good acting skills", seemed comfortable or good at.
I felt that while the younger artists performed brilliantly in the movie, the older actors for the most part, came out looking unbelievable. Here was the host of the show, who talks and mocks about a Chai waala, something they would NEVER do (and never did) in the original show. Some of his jabs are plain ridiculous and its unbelievable that the sets had an audience that seemed to enjoy it.
Dev Patel, as the innocent (confused? nervous? what was he trying to portray?) kid on the seat, was confusing in his expressions. One of my friends asked me during the movie, if he was blind. That was a genuine question, considering how Dev Patel looked a little blurry eyed in many scenes. Same with Mahesh Manjrekar as Latika's husband? His performance was a little over the top.
And yet despite these little faults, the movie does stick on to its promise of wrapping up with a fairytale ending. It gives you one last surprise though, and when it finally ends, you are not really unhappy. And it follows up with a Bollywood type number as the credits role, and thats the sweet chutney in your spicy Pani puri. No reservations whatsoever. The Pani puri has worked its magic.