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IMDbPro

Lion

  • 20162016
  • PG-13PG-13
  • 1h 58m
IMDb RATING
8.0/10
240K
YOUR RATING
POPULARITY
1,333
148
Rooney Mara and Dev Patel in Lion (2016)
Trailer for Lion
Play trailer2:34
27 Videos
99+ Photos
BiographyDrama
A five-year-old Indian boy is adopted by an Australian couple after getting lost hundreds of kilometers from home. 25 years later, he sets out to find his lost family.A five-year-old Indian boy is adopted by an Australian couple after getting lost hundreds of kilometers from home. 25 years later, he sets out to find his lost family.A five-year-old Indian boy is adopted by an Australian couple after getting lost hundreds of kilometers from home. 25 years later, he sets out to find his lost family.
IMDb RATING
8.0/10
240K
YOUR RATING
POPULARITY
1,333
148
    • Garth Davis
    • Saroo Brierley(adapted from the book "A Long Way Home" by)
    • Luke Davies(screenplay by)
  • Stars
    • Dev Patel
    • Nicole Kidman
    • Rooney Mara
    • Garth Davis
    • Saroo Brierley(adapted from the book "A Long Way Home" by)
    • Luke Davies(screenplay by)
  • Stars
    • Dev Patel
    • Nicole Kidman
    • Rooney Mara
  • See production, box office & company info
    • 624User reviews
    • 366Critic reviews
    • 69Metascore
  • See more at IMDbPro
    • Nominated for 6 Oscars

    Videos27

    Lion
    Trailer 2:34
    Watch Lion
    Lion
    Trailer 1:38
    Watch Lion
    Lion
    Trailer 2:23
    Watch Lion
    LION - Official US Trailer
    Trailer 2:27
    Watch LION - Official US Trailer
    Dev Patel on the Roles That Changed His Life
    Clip 1:44
    Watch Dev Patel on the Roles That Changed His Life
    Lion
    Clip 0:35
    Watch Lion
    Lion
    Clip 0:54
    Watch Lion
    Lion: The Return
    Clip 1:54
    Watch Lion: The Return
    Lion: Dont Know What It's Like
    Clip 0:53
    Watch Lion: Dont Know What It's Like
    Lion: Wandering
    Clip 1:34
    Watch Lion: Wandering
    Lion: I'm Lost
    Clip 1:01
    Watch Lion: I'm Lost
    Lion: Meeting John And Sue
    Clip 0:34
    Watch Lion: Meeting John And Sue

    Photos140

    Rooney Mara and Dev Patel in Lion (2016)
    Dev Patel in Lion (2016)
    Priyanka Bose at an event for Lion (2016)
    Dev Patel and Saroo Brierley at an event for Lion (2016)
    Nicole Kidman, Dev Patel, Priyanka Bose, and Saroo Brierley at an event for Lion (2016)
    Nicole Kidman at an event for Lion (2016)
    Dev Patel and Saroo Brierley at an event for Lion (2016)
    Dev Patel at an event for Lion (2016)
    Nicole Kidman, Rooney Mara, Dev Patel, and Sunny Pawar in Lion (2016)
    Dev Patel in Lion (2016)
    Rooney Mara, Dev Patel, Sunny Pawar, and Abhishek Bharate in Lion (2016)
    Dev Patel and Sunny Pawar in Lion (2016)

    Top cast

    Edit
    Dev Patel
    Dev Patel
    • Saroo Brierley
    Nicole Kidman
    Nicole Kidman
    • Sue Brierley
    Rooney Mara
    Rooney Mara
    • Lucy
    Sunny Pawar
    Sunny Pawar
    • Young Saroo
    Abhishek Bharate
    Abhishek Bharate
    • Guddu
    Priyanka Bose
    Priyanka Bose
    • Kamla
    Khushi Solanki
    • Young Shekila
    Shankar Nisode
    • Shankar
    Tannishtha Chatterjee
    Tannishtha Chatterjee
    • Noor
    Nawazuddin Siddiqui
    Nawazuddin Siddiqui
    • Rama
    Riddhi Sen
    Riddhi Sen
    • Café Man
    Kaushik Sen
    Kaushik Sen
    • Police Official
    • (as Koushik Sen)
    Rita Roy
    Rita Roy
    • Amita
    • (as Rita Boy)
    Udayshankar Pal
    • Liluah Teacher
    • (as Uday Shankar Paul)
    Surojit Das
    • Shonedeep…
    Deepti Naval
    Deepti Naval
    • Mrs. Sood
    Menik Gooneratne
    Menik Gooneratne
    • Swarmina
    David Wenham
    David Wenham
    • John Brierley
      • Garth Davis
      • Saroo Brierley(adapted from the book "A Long Way Home" by)
      • Luke Davies(screenplay by)
    • All cast & crew
    • Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

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    Storyline

    Edit

    Did you know

    Edit
    • Trivia
      To internalize her character, Priyanka Bose went to Madhya Pradesh to meet Kamla Munshi, the mother her character was based on: "My questions were basic and just by meeting her, I could tell how hard her life has been. I got down on my knees and hugged her and thanked her for her courage." When meeting Munshi she was told that she was declared crazy by many villagers in the small town for years, as she never gave up hope that her son would return one day.
    • Goofs
      Saroo is seen using a Samsung smart phone to calculate one of the distances. When the scene was set, Samsung hadn't released any smart phones.
    • Quotes

      Saroo Brierley: I'm sorry you couldn't have your own kids.

      Sue Brierley: What are you saying?

      Saroo Brierley: We... we... weren't blank pages, were we? Like your own would have been. You weren't just adopting us but our past as well. I feel like we're killing you.

      Sue Brierley: I could have had kids.

      Saroo Brierley: What?

      Sue Brierley: We chose not to have kids. We wanted the two of you. That's what we wanted. We wanted the two of you in our lives.That's what we chose.

      [pause]

      Sue Brierley: That's one of the reasons I fell in love with your dad.

      [pause]

      Sue Brierley: Because we both felt as if... the world has enough people in it. Have a child, couldn't guarantee it will make anything better. But to take a child that's suffering like you boys were. Give you a chance in the world. That's something.

    • Crazy credits
      There is no opening title card, only opening credits; the title card doesn't appear until the end.
    • Alternate versions
      The Extended Australian Edition runs approx. 12 minutes longer.
    • Connections
      Featured in The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon: Nicole Kidman/Michael Shannon/Miranda Lambert (2016)
    • Soundtracks
      Aaja Nindiya Aaja Nainan Beech Sama Ja
      Written by Khayyam

      (Saregama India/Mushroom Music)

      Performed by Lata Mangeshkar

      Licensed courtesy of Saregama India

    User reviews624

    Review
    Review
    Featured review
    8/10
    Waiting for Guddu...
    Whenever I wander in the streets of the Moroccan Medina, I feel at home. There's that strange mixture of various fragrances floating in the air: spices, kebab, frying delicacies (not much different from these appetizing jelabis), sea spray from the fish market, tanned leather from the shoe shop and this whole conglomerate smell outsiders or tourists might feel stinky, but as far as "my" senses are concerned, "there's no place like home". I didn't pick it, it picked me.

    And maybe there's something innately circular about life, we're born home, we move close or far from it, and there's the need to get back. I even have a personal theory: that even your children can find a deep "connection" with the place you were born in, your home will also feel like home for them. And it is indeed "A Long Way Home", the poignant and inspiring story of Saroo Brierley, born in India, lost at the age of five, adopted by an Australian couple and reuniting with his mother and his family twenty-five years later. What else can be said? It's a simple story but it's often in the most plain-looking grounds that you can find the most precious gems.

    Garth Davis' "Lion" is indeed simple in its storytelling; it's linear and straightforward in its clarity. Basically the whole first hour shows poor Saroo looking for his brother Guddu in hostile and overcrowded streets of Calcutta and finding a few moments of relief interrupted by adults, and in the huge lottery of karma, some can look extremely friendly and have sinister motives. But good fate sides with little Saroo and one lucky encounter leading to another, a couple of Australian tourist discovers the 'wanted notice' published in a newspaper and they instantly fall in love with the kid and adopt him. Saroo is then taught English and good manners.

    Then, something interesting happens: while I expected some resistance, he actually tries to fit in his new family as if he's aware that there's something really providential in that couple of good-hearted people from Tasmania, played by Nicole Kidman and David Brienham. The one twist that spoils the family harmony is the adoption of a mentally troubled and self-harming Indian boy named Mantosh one year later. "Lion" manages to say a lot without words, from the reaction of Sunny Pawar, who does a fine, subtle, acting job, I could feel that he didn't welcome this arrival with much enthusiasm but wouldn't display jealousy out of love for his new mom.

    And the way he grew up was in line with the character. Dev Patel finally makes his entrance as a brilliant young man in his mid-twenties, ready to embrace studies in hotel management, he's also a nice guy like you seldom see in movies, no tortured soul, no rebel, no wimp either and respectful toward his parents. Seeing Patel again made me regret how harshly I judged "Slumdog Millionnaire" but I never commented his acting but a script that took a rather simplistic turn near the end. So, I was glad to see Patel again, playing another guy trying to find a loved one through a "modern device" but I hoped Davis wouldn't derail the film from its beautiful simplicity.

    And I had a good scare when his soon-to-be girlfriend, played by Rooney Mara, started improvising a little dance on the streets as it almost felt like there would be some Bollywood number, but it was just her twisted way to seduce him, and it worked… well, to some degree. Personally, she struck me as a too cold and sophisticated girl, I didn't buy that a guy so warm and "sunny" like Saroo would fall in love with a younger version of Kristin Scott Thomas. Even the love scenes made me wonder if Mara wasn't still under the influence of her previous romance in "Carol". Never mind, the center of the movie were Patel and Kidman and as soon as Patel has this delicate 'Proust Madeleine' moment, the story takes off and with the miracle of "Google Earth", Saroo tries to find the way back home.

    The film tries to inject some 'suspense' in that powerful journey but that wasn't necessary, I think they could have just compressed the 'research' within the last weeks before Saroo's departure and avoided these little 'pending' moments, only to focus on the relationship with his adoptive mother and some emotional insights about the heights of generosity some hearts can reach. There were many heartfelt statements about adoption that could have enriched the story but the girlfriend allowed Saroo to explain his existential crisis to the audience without never really existing on her own, I didn't care for her anyway. The tormented brother could have made a more interesting foil for Saroo and would have provided a fine back-story paralleling Saroo's experience.

    While "Lion" isn't flawless, it's a movie whose emotional power relied on the ending, and when Saroo was getting closer to his home, I could find my own heart beating, that's for the empathy… and that was the price to pay, to earn that teary explosion of happiness and a few emotionally rewarding revelations, concluding one of the few 2016 movies of universal appeal. Indeed, If there ever was one statement to sum up the general appeal of movies, or stories regardless of their narrative medium, I would quote the late Roger Ebert who said "The more specific a film is, the more universal, because the more it understands individual characters, the more it applies to everyone".

    Truer words have never been spoken indeed. Garth Davis' "Lion" might have an Australian-Indian protagonist but anyone can relate to him, from India, Iceland, Jamaica, Morocco or any part of the world.
    helpful•31
    5
    • ElMaruecan82
    • Feb 26, 2017

    FAQ3

    • Seeing as Saroo knew the knew the name of his home village, why couldn't he have found this via an atlas or online search?

    Details

    Edit
    • Release date
      • January 6, 2017 (United States)
      • Australia
      • United Kingdom
      • United States
      • India
    • Official sites
      • Official Site
      • Official Site (Japan)
      • English
      • Hindi
      • Bengali
    • Also known as
    • Filming locations
      • Ganesh Talai, Khandwa, Madhya Pradesh, India
    • Production companies
      • The Weinstein Company
      • Screen Australia
      • See-Saw Films
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Box office

    Edit
    See detailed box office info on IMDbPro

    Technical specs

    Edit
    • 1 hour 58 minutes
      • Color
      • Dolby Digital

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