Slumdog Millionaire (2008)

A Mumbai teen who grew up in the slums, becomes a contestant on the Indian version of "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?" He is arrested under suspicion of cheating, and while being interrogated, events from his life history are shown which explain why he knows the answers.

Directors:

Danny Boyle, Loveleen Tandan

Writers:

Simon Beaufoy (screenplay), Vikas Swarup (novel)

Stars:

Dev Patel, Freida Pinto, Saurabh Shukla

Top 250 #243 | Won 8 Oscars. Another 141 wins & 81 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Dev Patel	...	Older Jamal
Saurabh Shukla	...	Sergeant Srinivas
Anil Kapoor	...	Prem
Rajendranath Zutshi	...	Director (as Raj Zutshi)
Jeneva Talwar	...	Vision Mixer
Freida Pinto	...	Older Latika
Irrfan Khan	...	Police Inspector
Azharuddin Mohammed Ismail	...	Youngest Salim
Ayush Mahesh Khedekar	...	Youngest Jamal
Jira Banjara	...	Airport Security Guard (as Hira Banjara)
Sheikh Wali	...	Airport Security Guard
Mahesh Manjrekar	...	Javed
Sanchita Choudhary	...	Jamal's Mother
Himanshu Tyagi	...	Mr Nanda
Sharib Hashmi	...	Prakash

Storyline

The story of Jamal Malik, an 18 year-old orphan from the slums of Mumbai, 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 Kaun Banega Crorepati? (2000) (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. Each chapter of his story reveals the key to the answer to one of the game show's questions. Each chapter of Jamal's increasingly layered story reveals where he learned the answers to the show's seemingly impossible quizzes. But one question remains a mystery: what is this young man with no apparent desire for riches really ...

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Plot Keywords:

slum | cheating | police | suspicion | millionaire | 

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Taglines:

Love and money... You have mixed them both.

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Genres:

Drama | Romance

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Certificate:

14A

Details

Official Sites:

Official site Official site [France]

Country:

UK India

Language:

English Hindi French

Release Date:

23 January 2009 (Canada)

Also Known As:

Le pouilleux millionnaire

Filming Locations:

Agra, Uttar Pradesh, India

Box Office

Budget:

$15,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend:

£1,827,457 (UK) (9 January 2009)

Gross:

$141,319,195 (USA) (22 May 2009)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Warner Bros., Celador Films, Film4

Technical Specs

Runtime:

120 min

Sound Mix:

SDDS Dolby Digital DTS

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

The film used a prototype Digital Cinema Camera from Silicon Imaging. When used in Mumbai, there were SI technicians on set constantly to deal with any problems the prototype had, of which there were many.

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Goofs

The original TV show "Who Wants to be a Millionaire" is recorded in studio some days before the actual broadcast. The show that we see in the film is broadcast live, which raises the incongruence that the person from home can easily see the question on TV, having plenty of time to come up with an answer before receiving the actual call. This explains the need to have the questions reread on the phone, and the credibility of the time limit. Moreover, the call itself is never directed to a mobile number, to prevent connection troubles, and for the same reason it's never issued directly when the contestant asks for it; the call is first made in the very moment the contestant begins his round and it's then kept live (but soundless) until the contestant calls for the hotline. As a side fact, after the hotline has been used the contact is still kept, so the contestant's people can hear live what happens from then on. However, this kind of show may have a 10-15-minute time delay.

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Quotes

Shruti Seth: Baali, keep up! The chaiwalah knows more than you.

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Crazy Credits

Several of the cast perform a traditional Bollywood song and dance number set in a train station over the end credits.

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Connections

References Zanjeer (1973)

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Soundtracks

Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?
Original music written by Keith Strachan and Matthew Strachan
Published by Lusam Music Ltd.

User Reviews

City of God Has One Vital Thing Slumdog Millionaire Does Not

Slumdog Millionaire is one of the most critically acclaimed movies of 2008 but the hype surrounding it is a bit undeserved. Don't get me wrong, this is at the very least a good movie and is quite a terrific movie 2/3 the way through. What the movie does though in the last 1/3 is make the fatal mistake of turning into a Hollywood or maybe in this case a Bollywood movie. It takes away from that genuine and satisfying feeling.

The acting all around was very good particularly from Dev Patel and the small kids. There performance are probably the only thing that is overlooked in this film. Without much of these very good performances the movie would not have been at the level it was at.The directing of Danny Boyle was his best yet. The look of the film was amazing and many screen shots of India were breathtaking. The musical score was very fitting to the style of the movie. It was one of the best scores of 2008. Where this film fell apart was at the writing. Towards the end its withdrew into a standard romance. It was no longer the great and amazing adventure we had witnessed for most of the movie. The complex relations seemed to be over simplified and it does the safe thing to do in the approach of tone but if taken into a drastically different direction could have lead it to be a real classic. Yet instead of ever peaking or sky rocketing to greatness it had plateaued and didn't deliver the way I had hoped it would, this largely in part by the failure of the screenplay.

Many people have compared this film to City of God because the film are actually similar in many ways. Yet City of God has something Slumdog Millionaire does not have which is depth and character motivations. These things are vital to these kind of movies being successful. City of God seemed to have a more plausible story because the story was more linear. Events took place as a result of other events. This did not happen in Slumdog Millionaire, the story was more chopped up and too many of the events just seemed to pop up out of no where. Slumdog Millionaire did take a very ambitious approach in the way it was made which is commendable. Is this a 1st rate movie though? The answer to that is no.