Does contain uncomfortable scenes but what a brilliant movie!

Rating: 9/10 (10 February 2009)

Saw Slumdog Millionaire with an international women's group. Some of the facets of India portrayed made me squirm wondering what questions I would be asked by my friends after the movie... but none of it was fiction... And as to the questions about the slums of Mumbai, you could hardly expect a movie called Slumdog Millionaire not to actually show the slums, could you?!
But as the movie went on, I realized I did not and should not have to explain anything. India is complicated and diverse and just because there are a number of uncomfortable scenes  of police brutality, poverty in the slums, Hindu-Muslim conflicts, children begging in the streets  doesn't mean that that is all India is about. And if that is what people take away from the movie and feel too disturbed or scared to visit India, I think we can do without their foreign exchange!! It's the same if one watches No Country for Old Men and thinks the US is full of drug dealing Mexicans and gun toting psychopaths!
I guess with an English director at the helm, it is predictable for us Indians to get on the defensive thinking that he wants to show our country up as being poor and brutal where life is a struggle... but a large part of India IS poor and life IS a struggle. Living in Switzerland for the past four and a half years, the first thing that struck me here was the fact that I am indulging in escapism. You absolutely do not encounter anything here to disturb you or worry you or make you feel sad on a daily basis, whereas back home in India, you DO encounter poverty on a daily basis because it is everywhere for you to see.
The cast was brilliant, the music even more hauntingly so. I was also amused at the choice of Anil Kapoor as the host considering he had trouble saying the words 'millionaire' and 'question'!!