Slumdog Millionaire

Okay, last night this li'l underdog flick swept the Golden Globes, so it further substantiates why I am telling you to do everything in your power to see it!! The movie is striking in so many ways, including its unusual approach in depicting poverty. While most movies sentimentalize or pity the poor, this movie takes a view that’s not all that different from that taken by Jesus in the Gospels.

Based on an Indian novel by Vikas Swarup, the movie centers on Jamal Malik (Dev Patel), an 18-year-old orphan who is on the verge of winning millions on a televised Indian game show. With each trivia question, the picture flashes back to an earlier time in Jamal’s Dickensian youth, detailing the extraordinary education that lead to his knowledge of the answers. who is about to experience the biggest day of his life. With the whole nation watching, he is just one question away from winning a staggering 20 million rupees on India's "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?" But when the show breaks for the night, police arrest him on suspicion of cheating; how could a street kid know so much? Desperate to prove his innocence, Jamal tells the story of his life in the slum where he and his brother grew up, of their adventures together on the road, of vicious encounters with local gangs, and of Latika, the girl he loved and lost. Intrigued by Jamal's story, the jaded Police Inspector begins to wonder what a young man with no apparent desire for riches is really doing on this game show? When the new day dawns and Jamal returns to answer the final question, the Inspector and sixty million viewers are about to find out...

Director Danny Boyle filmed “Slumdog Millionaire” on location in India, and much of the movie takes place in the poorest sections of Mumbai. Most of the child actors in these scenes are actual slum residents. One reviewer states, "What’s startling about the scenes is not only the festering milieu – the children skip over channels of raw sewage – but also the way Boyle allows the kids their youthful exuberance. He recognizes both their misery and their vitality. Hardly the sallow urchins of a Sally Struthers infomercial, these children are given their full humanity."

It seems to me that throughout the Gospels, Jesus encountered the poor in much the same way. Luke in particular presents a Jesus who spent time not with the powerful and wealthy but rather the lowly and in need, whether it was the paralytic who was lowered through the roof by his friends or the widow who lost her son. In both cases, Jesus approached them not as a superior being who had come to relieve them of their pitiable suffering, but as a caring, fellow sufferer – as a friend.

Interestingly, the few negative reviews “Slumdog Millionaire” has received have taken the movie to task for exactly this sort of egalitarian worldview. Some reviewers have accused Boyle’s picture of being too “glossy.” Owen Gleiberman, writing for Entertainment Weekly, even said that it “ennobles poverty.” Hardly! Like the Gospels, “Slumdog Millionaire” ennobles the poor! YOU'VE GOT TO SEE IT!!