a social commentary on the conditions depicted in this movie

Rating: 9/10 (14 February 2009)

The movie is admittedly excellent, and real. What gets us, though, is the nearly unanimous use by reviewers and commentators of happy words like "uplifting" and "exhilarating" to describe this movie. Instead, I would use words such as "scary" and "nightmarish." The conditions depicted in this film are like Dante's inferno. The poverty and squalor of vast tracts of Mumbai, a typical Indian mega-city. Shanty cardboard towns as far as the eye can see. What we are shown is the Armageddon to which the world may be coming, due to over-population and a globalized growth economy. People living on giant waste disposal dumps the size of mid-size American towns, like scavenging vultures. Human anthills. The horror of garbage-infested streams in which people bathe, a child escaping through feces. The terror of murderous tribal strife, in which people torch each other to death. Child kidnappers who burn out their victims' eyes to make them more effective beggars. Then the grotesque contrast with billion-dollar luxury skyscrapers inhabited by millionaire gangsters. This is uplifting? The movie deserves Oscar nominations, and even an Oscar or two. But uplifting? No. Frightening and horrific, yes. Tom and Anita Kando, Sacramento.