I can’t contain myself, I HAVE to live-blog the Golden Globes. That statement itself might be a spoiler, I know. If you’re on PST, have this isht on DVR or otherwise loathe learning something before you’re supposed to, don’t go past the jump.
[And if you are a Wesssssider, then come on. You’re used to this, so no need to complain…I’m from there, I remember the feeling, but there’s nothing to be done. Except move here. Which is what I did. ;)]
If you’re on the right coast and feel like gettin’ your Mutiny on…party over here!Simon Beaufoy just accepted a Golden Globe award for “Best Screenplay”, for Slumdog Millionaire.
My hasty attempt to transcribe his remarks:
“Thank you very much, Hollywood Foreign Press Association. It’s an absolute honor. We really weren’t expecting to be here in America at all at one time, so it’s just amazing to be standing here. It started with Vikas Swarup who wrote the novel “Q+A” that amazing book about Mumbai, it went to Tessa Ross (?) the cleverest film woman in Britain, who gave it to me, who sent it to a man called Christian Colson, who produced the film and it went through many many other peoples hands, too many to say thank you to, but to all of them, thank you. And finally it got to Danny, there are some people…there are some directors who shoot a screenwriter’s script and there are once-in-a-blue-moon a director who comes along to make it fly and I don’t need to tell you that he made it fly. Thank you Danny, Thank you to Jane, my wife and my children.”
Felicitations to Freida Pinto, who is beautiful– and elated. Sweetly dorky Dev Patel looks dashing in a cutaway collar and I want to kiss him for it– that table is always sadly ignored at my local Thomas Pink. Then again he’s from England, so they’re not terrified of them over there.
Aside: am I hallucinating or are non-brownz wearing desi clothes? I rushed home but missed the first hour, so I did not get to see the red carpet, and thus, no full-length views to confirm. Haven’t seen Freida’s entire dress, either.
Totally unrelated aside: Renee…fire your makeup artist AND your stylist. Ugh, ugh, utterly fug.
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Annnnd…A.R. Rahman, who is up for “Best Score”, gets his name mangled by Kate Beckinsale/Puffy. A.R. Roomin’? Like, I’m roomin’ with a total slob? Awesome.
I shall overlook such stupidity, however, because I get to transcribe an ACCEPTANCE SPEECH! 😀
“Unbelievable. Uh, I’ve got this long list I thought I won’t win so anyways thanks to the almighty God for bringing me here, Danny Boyle, Kristin from Cellar Door (?), Fox pictures, all my musicians in Chennai, Mumbai, Samuel Long, Karan Grover, M.I.A. for the collaboration Sam Schwartz (?), Allison and the billion people from India. Thanks for all your prayers.”
I’ve never seen him live, so this is mad exciting for me. His happiness and nervous energy are cute. I like his tux, but a mutineer who is here says the tie reminds him of an undertaker’s. That same mutineer is another ABD of Tamizzhrl extraction, who is now mocking me for my inability to understand some of what A.R. ROOMIN’ was saying.
He actually had to translate for me, especially after he heard me mutter, “Karen WHO?” when Karan Grover was what had been uttered. I didn’t even understand M.I.A. the first time I heard it (Em, em, eye, eye, ay, ay…MIA. zomg. Me. Her stalker. I should give back my CDs.)
I am shame spiraling accordingly. Said spiral commenced after hearing, “look at who thinks she’s a gully South Indian, who can’t understand what my Tamil compatriot is saying…”. Oy. Pwned.
Uh, David Duchovny, thanks but no thanks for your INACCURATE clarification?!
“Um, a slight correction, the gentleman who just won the last award his name is A.R. ROOMIN’, I’m told, so…thank you.”
Wtf?
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Mutineer apsara77 points us to the High Heel Confidential blog, which is currently featuring this picture:
Hrm. Freida’s dress looks okay from that angle, but I’m not a fan of its view straight-on. Decking those hips with boughs of…chartreuce silk? Why?
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DANNY BOYLE!!! Well at least they pronounced HIS name correctly. :p
I’ll try and transcribe his thank-you speech soon, but my helpful, remote-control-pausin’-friend ran off to get Five Guys and I can’t do it on my own. No woman is an island. Especially when she’s craving a grilled-cheese with peppers and tomatoes. Live-blogging makes me hungry!
“Listen, thanks ever so much, Golden Globes or the GGs as we very affectionately refer to them. Your mad, pulsating affection for our film is much-appreciated. Really deeply appreciate it. Um, I have to thank Tessa Ross, who has been thanked before and there’s a reason for that, she’s an extraordinary person. I have to thank uh, Peter Rice, from Fox Searchlight, without whom I wouldn’t be here, standing here, absolutely, I have to thank Cellar Door, I have to thank Pathay (?), um there’s so many people to thank, which I know everybody goes on about. I’ve got to thank my agent, Robert Newman, again, without whom I wouldn’t be here. Um, making a film is a family affair obviously, and the people in Mumbai, who are all watching by the way, big shout of love to them and particularly Loveleen Tandon…?…?…and our three musketeers, Tabrez, Pervesh and Sanjay (?) and finally, and most appropriately in this house, to the actors, particularly Anil, Dev and Freida and Madhur (?) and the six, the six young actors who played the other parts in the movie, who were fantastic. Um, I just want to finish by thanking my kids, Grace, Gabriel and Galen and Gail who is their mom and anyway thanks ever so much. Bye-bye.”
I have had to sit here (while starving) smelling fresh, hot cajun fries while typing all that. Never question the sacrifices bloggers make for you. Never. 😉
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Lesson learned. Never leave a Five Guys grilled cheese to sweat in foil while typing furiously. I was so sad about my mushy sandwich, until I looked up at the screen. Wait. Could it be? Was such a thing even possible?
Was Shah Rukh Khan wearing a sequined tie under his shirt?
Wow.
Maybe wearing it under his shirt is better than over, come to think of it.
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Wot’s this? An even BETTER distraction from my soggy sandwich?
BEST PICTURE!!!
A standing ovation for the other SM, Slumdog Millionaire. 🙂 Christian Colson accepts the award:
“Come on guys, get up here…Dev. Uh wow, thanks so much to the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, that’s quite hard to say after a few martinis. It’s an enormous honor for me to be collecting this on behalf of everyone involved in making this film. Um, I’d like to say a few very big thank yous to a few very big cheeses, first of all, Peter Rice of Fox Searchlight, Jeff Robinoff at Warner Brothers…uh…Paul Smith at Cellar Door films, Tessa Ross at Film Four…uh…???…we couldn’t have had a smarter or more supportive bunch of partners watching over us as we made this film so thanks to all of them. Um, we had the great privilege of working for a fantastic cast and crew in Mumbai who will be going nuts as they watch this tonight, they will be going absolutely mental, so Hello to all of them and we’ll see you next week when we come out for the opening of the film in India next Thursday…uh…and that’s going to be some party, I think. Um, our fantastic cast, Dev Patel, Freida Pinto, Madhur Mittal and everyone else, all our young cast, Anil and Irfan, Simon Beaufoy who gave us all an incredible opportunity by writing an extraordinary screenplay and the great Danny Boyle, who brought it so miraculously to life. My mum, my dad, my girlfriend for only dumping me once. Thank you very much. Good night.”
Again, I may not have caught every word of the speech, but that should be most of it. FOUR! They won FOUR! Who’s ready to party in the bunker?
::
I love how wiki is already updated with the news. Here’s the list of trophies won:
* Won: Best Motion Picture – Drama
* Won: Best Director – Motion Picture – Danny Boyle
* Won: Best Screenplay – Simon Beaufoy
* Won: Best Original Score – A. R. Rahman
[wiki]
::
I think it’s safe to update the title at this point. So I did.
154 · TARP said
1992 was the year ARR exploded into the scene..he had two hit soundtracks…One malayalam movie called YODHA and tamil movie ROJA..But he had done jingles for ads before…
Isn’t that what judgment is for, to decide, without doing the action, whether or not to actually do the action? 🙂 As the old saying goes, you don’t need to make an omlette to know that an egg is bad. And I must thank you for your brief review, as it is one of the things that made me decide not to see it. 😉
Didn’t say this. But, if the movie’s USP is just slums and slum-kids, this is true. Strip out the slums from the movie and see what you’ve got.
144 · bess said
well, it seems there is a lot to learn from dharavi.
nytimes on ‘poverty tours.’
monkeys entered our house as i was writing the post. they stole my mango. don’t make a horrible pun about that.
80 · KXB said
If Juhu slumdwellers are any indicators, not very well. Juhu slumdwellers prefer Ghajini
Predictions:
“slumdog” will now be used as a racial epithet hurled at desis.
Many “uplifting” new movies will be made about India based on the glaring problems of indian society. Such as casteism, widow shunning, child slavery and so on.
Looks like the “slum urchin” actors are actually from cushy upper-class backgrounds:
“The three, aged 11-14, essay childhood characters of the protagonists. Ashutosh Lobo Gajiwala, son of plastic surgeon Kalpesh and his doctor wife Astrid, says, I am banking on friends to call me after the announcement because we do not have cable television at home. Pixie-faced Tanay Chheda is his schoolmate at Campion while the dusky, long-legged Tanvi Lonkar is a student from Malad.
But with the characters nowhere close to the kids comfortable middle-class lives, the make-up department had quite a job on its hands. The 11-year-old Tanay, who plays protagonist Jamal Malik in his childhood, recalls shooting in Andheris Gilbert Hill slums, Curious boys from the gullies would surround me and ask what I was doing. Once, when I was wearing make-up, a big bully thought I was a trespassing urchin and gave me a sound whack. The unit members had to rescue me.
Tanay has always been a cleanliness freak and hates getting a speck of dirt on his body. Even as a toddler he would never fully sit in the garden or on the beach. Imagine his agony at having to play a scruffy slumdweller, teases his mother Tejal.
However, parts of the script made not just the children but their parents squirm. Ashutosh, playing the young Salim, Jamals rogue brother, had smoking and doping as part of his profile, which scandalised his parents until they learnt the unit had imported nicotine-free cigarettes. The language the children had to used, though, is still a source of embarrassment.
But all of us received five-star treatment, says Tanvis father, a bank employee. Tejal, whose son has worked with Indian productions before, knows the difference, This production house is based in the US which has strict laws on child actors.
Recently, Slumdog director Danny Boyle hosted a party for the children at a suburban five-star hotel. And in the countdown to the big night, he answers every SMS from the children and their parents. Hope, not expect, he wrote to Dr Gajiwala. Keeping my fingers firmly crossed. All of them are doing likewise.”
Ummmm….it was obviously the three youngest kids who were from the slums, which is why the dialogue had to be in Hindi. When the characters were teenagers, the dialogue was mostly in English. It was obvious they were middle class kids and no one claimed any different.
portmanteau said:
Thanks, port, for the links. The photos of Dharavi in the Prakash Apte article showing the shelters made of remnants and scrap metal remind me of some of the work I’ve seen done by Samuel Mockbee’s Rural Studio. Who will be the Sudhir Venkatesh of Dharavi?
Where do you see her getting all this attention?
“Slumdog Solution: ‘Beggar & Breakfast'”
This bitterly acerbic piece from the TOI struck me as wickedly delicious, tinged with alternating strands of faux-righteous outrage and campy sarcasm. This passage is particularly delishus:
That TOI piece also has this which had me scratching my head:
“Poverty is the economic equivalent of sexual pornography, and like pornography excites voyeurism: the poor, poor things; how they suffer, and yet how ennobled and ennobling they are in their suffering. In other words, there but for the grace of GDP go we. Poverty is great. So long as it belongs to someone else, and we’re safely insulated from it, like visitors to a zoo where the inmates are safely caged.”
Yeah, I don’t care for that paragraph, at all. To be reminded of the human condition, through art, is voyeurism? I think what the writer is really saying is this: these poor belong to me and my people. How dare you think you can make a movie about it? Am I misinterpreting what the writer of the piece is saying? If I am, tell me how. It’s a confusing para.
166 · onparkstreet said
Not really. There are movies that are set among the poor which use the poverty backdrop as more than a set piece. I can’t divine what the TOI writer was thinking, but in the context of the movie, I read it as saying the movie was exploitative in the way it depicted poverty. I don’t think that’s an unfair charge. The movie was ultimately a frothy entertainer which derived dramatic mileage from poverty, without ever seriously engaging it. That’s why I made my first comment about it being an enjoyable first-time experience, but one that I doubt will last.
Slumdog Millionaire was a good movie and kids in India are proud right now due to the recognition that one of their own (Rahman) is getting. Whether or not it deserved all those awards is up for debate.
Seems that desis in America are more worried about the “image” the movie portrays than Indians themselves (Indian citizens living in India). I’ve read some Indian reviews and they pretty much agree that that kind of stuff (all the bad stuff shown in the movie) are indeed frequent happenings in India. But of course non of us would have experienced that, right?
How lucky we are!
As for the comments regarding “NISHABD”. I had to watch that film after all the bad reviews.
It was not bad or bold, just boring.
The subject matter is not taboo viewing for Indian cinema goers, it was just portrayed in a very slow moving way with no item numbers and only 1 sub-plot. Indian cinema goers are used to several item numbers in a film and multiple sub-plots. There was also no chemistry between Big B’s character and that of Jia. It was an un-convincing film.
hooray for slumdog!
i wasn’t going to tune in to the oscars next month. but now i am 🙂
fingers-crossed!
“Amitabh Bachchan slams Slumdog Millionaire“
It’s mildly amusing to witness all of the shrieks of offended dignity emanating from the creme de la creme of indian cultural life, such as it is. Some of the comments are really over the top.
As some one who has lived in Bombay for most of her life, I would say that this movie is spot on. Slums exist! It is an accepted fact for people living in Bombay. Most people offended by the portrayal of “Indian poverty” in this movie have IMO have never been to Bombay . It is funny how that actor Bachaan whines about poverty. There are slums just outside his little mansion at JVPD scheme. It looks like sour grapes since new actors like Frieda Pinto seems to get the recognition that these hacks never got in their lifetime of making crappy Bollywood ‘movies’.
“It looks like sour grapes since new actors like Frieda Pinto seems to get the recognition that these hacks never got in their lifetime of making crappy Bollywood ‘movies’.”
i haven’t read mr. bachchan’s blog on this movie, but let’s not get carried away. he may indeed be whining or incorrect or even a bit jealous, who knows? i’ve read that he has turned down english-speaking parts before. but that doesn’t make him a hack who has never made a good movie nor does it make ms. pinto anything more than a one-hit wonder so far. she’s attractive and she may move on to bigger and better things, but based on this movie alone, she didn’t exactly “own” the movie – the younger girls were, to me, far more impressive as actors. the movie’s globe recognition certainly doesn’t mean anything substantially more than any award mr. bachchan received in his own country.
does not mean that their performances were not more (or equally) worthy of recognition – they just were not in the “right” vehicles for western recognition. quite frankly, frieda’s performance was forgettable. and nothing in comparison, as WGIIA said, to that of the younger actors. it’s nice that india is getting this attention from the west but it does not mean that the particular performances chosen by the AFP were worthy of the awards (as is the case with even western films), nor does it mean that performances that are not recognized by such fora – even “bollywood” films – are not worthy of recognition as fine performances. somehow, india’s better films fail to garner this kind of attention, and i think that has as much to do with the appeal of the subject matter of such films to these judging panels as it does with the marketing/campaigning element to get into these awards.
Wow, and I thought I had already lost all respect for Big B. How can one even begin to compare the mind-numbing crap sludged out of so many Bollywood studios with the works of Satyajit Ray? Ray was a visionary, his films pushed boundaries and forced audiences to question the basis of life decisions. His films tackled poverty, racism, adultery, and religious fanaticism. And Bachchan is upset no one in the West pays attention to movies like Chandni Chowk to China?
Give me a break. Let’s face it, much of Bollywood is not about thinking. It’s about the exact opposite — which is completely fine. But don’t complain that these escapist films deserve some praise beyond Filmfare. They don’t. Critically they are equivalent Fool’s Gold, Four Christmases, Saw V, etc. They might win People’s Choice Awards, but they aren’t advancing the film art form.
I am tired of people complaining that this film does not deserve recognition because it portrays our motherland in a not-so-Bollywood-glam light. Poverty in India is so pervasive that most of the population has become desensitized to it. It’s an issue worth discussing, why can’t Slumdog begin the dialogue?
I don’t know if it is sour grapes. After all, the slum kid jumps into s*&t to get an autograph from Big B. I don’t know if that was an honorable mention or a not so honorable mention. Maybe that pissed him off. But I love how bollywood thinks getting a tattoo and wearing sunglasses while shooting dance sequences in swiss makes them cool and worthy of any awards.
Krodha >>Predictions: “slumdog” will now be used as a racial epithet hurled at desis. Many “uplifting” new movies will be made about India based on the glaring problems of indian society. Such as casteism, widow shunning, child slavery and so on.
Well, I wonder, if one could have made Slumdog Millionaire based on a story from a city in a developed nation. Certain places are bound to certain events and culture, but there is no point in being distressed about it. To do so repeatedly, while insinuating inferiority complex, suggests character flaws, that I’d rather think, you don’t have at all.
“It’s an issue worth discussing, why can’t Slumdog begin the dialogue?”
i don’t think slumdog begins the dialogue – other movies from india have already done that – nor does it really advance it in any way beyond a being wafer-thin look at poverty. to its credit, i don’t think it pretends to. it’s basically an entertaining, sometimes cliched (but not in a mean intentional way, i don’t think) account of a young man’s life. it’s not too preachy one way or the other. i read someone’s comment somewhere else that a movie that starts with a boy being tortured and ends with a bollywood-like dance is ridiculous because its implausible. why? life is full of sorrow, happiness, strange happenings and boredom – sometimes all in a single day. why is it so impossible that this could have happened in real life? what about oliver twist the musical? was that outlandish – a bunch of dirt-poor, abused boys singing? you hear of outlandish life stories sometimes. hollywood movies, even the oscar-winning ones are full of implausibilities. song and dance is seen as a means of communication throughout india.
in addition to exploring issues, movies also have a duty to entertain and i don’t see too many poor people in india going to see slumdog or wondering why it didn’t explore their situation better. this doesn’t mean rubbish escapist fare should be accepted or that issues-films shouldn’t be made, but escapist fare or even moderately unbelievable fare done well is no crime. one shouldn’t have to feel like slitting one’s wrists everytime one comes out of a movie because the world is so dark and dreary. i’d rather have something entertaining (and it can be meaningful) than something pretentious that leads to actors getting on stage and acting has if they’ve saved the world with their “deep” film.
as for these awards, cary grant, hitchcock and chaplin never actually won an oscar for their work – only receiving lifetime awards in the twilight of their years. doesn’t diminish them or their oft “escapist” fare in any way.
“one shouldn’t have to feel like slitting one’s wrists everytime one comes out of a movie because the world is so dark and dreary.”
should also add that many rubbish indian “meant-to-entertain” movies also make one want to slit one’s wrists, even if the world is bright and cheery.
160 · Krodha said
A fitting response would be: “what’s up pussy (long pause)….cat”? I leave the emphasis to you.
Cliched, entertaining movie. Too many third world tragedies happening to the same protagonist. Many in India would be hurt and angry. Kindly sit tight, fasten your seat belts and quit smoking for a longer life. Will see you at the same place in 50 years time. And the joke will be on them
168 · Femidesi said
That much is pretty obvious. You really have to wonder about the character and upbringing of such people. These same people will cry at the drop of a hat over the sufferings of palestinians, tibetans, chinese etc who look far better off than their own countrymen, but the tears magically dry up instantly when the vastly greater suffering in India is pointed out. I believe it is nothing but a shameful example of racial self-hatred.
171 · karen said
Well said. What’s so disgusting about these selfish creatures is that they are offended by any mention of widespread indian poverty, not by the fact that this hunger and poverty (the worst in the world) is allowed to exist in “India Shining”!
174 · samsaricanu said
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Exactly. Since the indians who have made it are more interested in living in denial and fantasy, and since Bollywood and the media feed their delusions, that means it will take foreigners such as these brits to begin the dialog about the indefensible poverty, casteism, misogyny etc that make India such a miserable place to live in.
The Brit, and Fox, didn’t make the movie for any such dialogue, they made it to make money. The movie does nothing to solve the problems you point out. It just allowed Goras to sell India’s poverty and make money, just as they sell Yoga and frozen Samosa and make money. Goras will sell anyone’s anything, doesn’t matter what effect the selling has — where do you think all the terrorist organisations in the world get their weapons?
They just showed that destitution sells well in film. Not that this selling is unknown, most of the five-star tourists who come to India are on a similar sympathy trip — see the destitution and feel good about themselves.
I just read the TOI piece, and Jug Suraiya is exactly right.
Of all movies to begin a dialogue you want this one? The exploration of poverty in this is paper-thin. What dialogue is there to be had based on that?
What planet are you living on in which Indians don’t know or talk about the poverty in their country? You realize the skeleton of the plot is based on a book written by an Indian right? You likewise realize that any time anyone tries anything in India a thousand and one interest groups come out of the woodwork and start sending letters to the editor in Western newspapers to excoriate the government for not giving away ever bigger doles to the poor (e.g. Chandraayan).
Do you really not see how chronically casting a country as a poor basket-case might actually disincentivize the kind of investment that would help them get out of being a poor basket-case? Have you not noticed that nobody bats an eyelash or lifts a finger or reports in the news any of the evils that happen in Africa because years and years and years worth of “LOOK AT THESE STARVING PEOPLE” propaganda has made people not only ignorant of the myriad rich cultural heritages in Africa, but also deters them from ever lifting a finger to help because “This is Africa and everything is screwed up anyway?”
Believe me nobody here or in India is blind to the problems of poverty. What Indians don’t need, however, are the same bunch of Western hypocrites who created the problem with their imperialist “White Man’s Burden” garbage then come in and presume to lecture them about how to run their own damn country.
185 · NaraVara said
Typical indian response whenever the issue of the massive hunger and poverty in India is raised: the white man did this to us! The other typical response: there is poverty in the Western nations too! How can you have a dialog when it is always shouted down thusly by these thick-skinned, heartless, loudmouths?
India has been run by native indians, not westerners, for three generations now. In both percentage and absolute terms India leads the world in hunger which is the most extreme form of poverty. Explain why your kind keeps blaming the West for India’s unwillingness to feed its people? For it is most certainly a lack of will not of resources. Are white westerners blocking lorries carrying food from the overflowing godowns to the hungry masses of India? Did westerners impose the abominable caste system, child slavery, misogyny etc on hindus? Etc, etc???
As always, Prema is spot on. Slumdog Millionaire will create a revolutionary concern among white people for the downtrodden that we Indians like to pretend don’t exist. Who doesn’t remember how Dances with Wolves instantly eliminated the problems of alcoholism, poverty and broken homes affecting Native American communities, or how that Malcom X movie ended racism once and for all!
186 · Slumdog said
Oh, so your solution is handouts to the poor? Because that’s such an effective and sustainable long-term solution to the problem.
You know the Japanese, Taiwanese, Chinese, and Koreans pulled their countries out of poverty and they didn’t do it through endless whining about the inherent inferiority of Chinese (et al) culture due to foot-binding, chattel slavery, etc. In fact, they shot those people and went right on actually fixing the problems instead of whining about them.
Also, read the development literature. Growth generally depends on the political institutions you have to run the show. India still runs on the same institutions the British put in place and Indian wannabe intellectuals still crawl on their hands and knees seeking handouts, accolades, and pats on the head from Westerners rather than the actual betterment of their own country. To say that the vestiges of colonialism magically disappeared the minute the Brits left is downright ignorant.
Actually, if you read the history they did, in fact, have a hand in it. Misogyny and homophobia were codified through Victorian era laws imposed by the British government. The census taken by the East India company and later the Empire of India helped to ossify the caste-system and eliminated the possibility of upward mobility among castes. Child “slavery” is just a consequence of poverty and lack of effective law enforcement to combat it.
So once again, all you’re throwing at me is problems and assertions of the inherent inferiority of Indians. I have not seen one proposed solution to any of these intractable problems you’re complaining about and this is what Indians get offended by. Pompous foreigners and anti-nationals coming in to harangue them about how to run their own country without a single God-damned solution in mind to fix anything.
188 · NaraVara said
I think by this point, it’s no longer a question of whether one’s culture is “inferior” or “adequate” to solve the myriad problems facing South Asia. The Chinese et al. acted while it was still not too late, before their population careened inexorably toward the 2 billion mark. Before they exceeded the carrying capacity of the land. Before malnutrition and lack of education blighted entire generations of future workers. I think sadly for South Asia and for the world at large whose fate it is to share the planet with South Asia, by this point there are simply too many problems in the subcontinent that defy any possible human solution.
NaraVara you are great – And I don’t know where Slumdog/Prema/Valmiki gets her info that India has the worst poverty. The worst poverty is and continues to be in places where there are famines, such Ethiopia and other parts of Africa. Plus China has a huge malnourishment problem too. India has taken a different route than China, THANK GOD, and we will have to develop in a different way, rather than complete censorship, govt approved mass murder of millions ; and with this censorship we don’t know exactly what the rates of malnourishment are in that country. India was one of the richest regions of the world in past centuries which is one reasons that we have now a huge population now. What worked then doesn’t work now, and the world has new human rights standards. If a poor, former colony has shown a commitment to democracy the way India has, I’m sure we can use the brilliant people in our country to improve the standrard of living.
I loved Slumdog Millionaire by the way and I don’t have a problem with the poverty of Bombay getting attention. Thank goodness. Freida is beautiful but watching her interview on Ultrabrown in letterman, I think, I don’t think she gets it. What I detest are ignoramuses that will watch a film set mostly among India’s impoverished, and then assume that’s all there is to it. I mean I watched that movie, “Gone Baby Gone” set in northeastern towns of abject poverty and corruption and I don’t go around thinking all white people are like that…I hope most people who see this movie, can see India, like other countries has it’s unique ups and downs.
I didn’t say India should be like China. Part of the reason the rest of the world is interested in and fascinated by India is precisely because we didn’t go down the “Shoot everyone who dissents in the face” route. But other countries, like Japan and Singapore, didn’t go that route either and they did well for themselves. It’s not so much about the deficiencies in their cultures as it is the willingness of their leaders to actually fix problems rather than constantly drumming them up, grievance-mongering, and playing the victim to draw international sympathy.
If you want to fix Indian poverty and problems of discrimination the discussion needs to move from “Look at how poor we are” and “Look at how eeeevil those barbaric Hindus are with their caste system” to “Here is a tested and proven solution to problem X, let’s talk about how best to implement it.” Unfortunately most of the Indian Left is more concerned with punishing the advantaged rather than uplifting the disadvantaged.
And for people like Slumdog up there, unless we spend every waking moment tearing out our hair and crying about the unfairness of it all then we must all be EVIL, HEARTLESS BASTARDS. How can we possibly be proud of and celebrate our culture and our country when there are bad things going on there!?
This is true, but we should also keep in mind that there is more to Ethiopia than famine and instability. It is a rich and vibrant culture in its own right. It’s important to keep this in mind not only out of respect to the Ethiopians to not be constantly associating their country with negative things, but also to fix the problems of chronic poverty. You can’t spend all your time looking at deficiencies. At some point those deficiencies need to be addressed by looking at what is good about their culture and society. Things that can be used to overcome the deficiencies and traits that can make Ethiopians proud and optimistic enough about their country to actually want to get up off their keisters and help.
like Japan and Singapore, didn’t go that route either and they did well for themselves
I understand that, but I think these countries are very different than India. First the huge expanse of the country and then the diversity of religions, languages, cultures, ethnicities…all of this has to be accomodated in a route that isn’t “shoot everyone that dissents”. My dad always says that could never happen in India – Indians are too argumentative, as Sen likes to point out.
Furthermore, Japan was built from the ground by the US after abysmally being defeated. As one of the profs used to say, Japan let the US colonize it. The infrastructure, their constitution was all created and written under the US. Again, India had to go a different route from the creation of the its Constitution to allowing another developed country come in and control the country…like many developing countries have had happen with puppet govts, etc.
192· PS said
Malaysia, while not as successful as Singapore, is similarly diverse and they’ve been doing okay. I realize India’s size and diversity poses some serious problems, but it’s nothing that can’t be overcome. It’s just a matter of having the right political institutions. Institutions which are congruous with the culture and the people they are supposed to serve and properly designed to serve the nation rather than keep it under heel the way British colonial ones were.
Malaysia, while not as successful as Singapore, is similarly diverse and they’ve been doing okay.
I don’t think Malaysia’s size and diversity is anything compared to India and it’s not a democracy and has no problem legally discriminating against the S Asian and Chinese immigrants that have lived their for at least a century.
I realize India’s size and diversity poses some serious problems, but it’s nothing that can’t be overcome.
Absolutely agree.
192 · PS said
Ignorant nonsense. Japan was already recognized as a fellow Great Power by the West more than a century ago, thanks to the indigenous Meiji Restoration. Meanwhile after 60 years of independence India leads the world in the most abject form of poverty: hunger. Yet we have indians like you and NaraVara either denying this well-established FACT or blaming whites for the failures of india’s indigenous leaders.
Ignorant nonsense. Japan was already recognized as a fellow Great Power
LOL Prema, you really are ridiculous. Yes, Japan was a power for about 50 years, (go back in India’s history and see powerful states that lasted much longer, but I digress) – Japan was a power and then it suffered complete destruction, it was a power based on a totalitarian regime. After which the country was rebuilt by the U.S. constitution and all. And really you spouting about India…Like I’ve said, the worst poverty is those regions in the world that have famines. Solving India’s problems or other developing nations doesn’t come from manipulating the data so you could spout out on about your Hindu hatred. And LOL about me ignoring India’s problems…no, I’ll stick with Amartya Sen and his like and their assessment of India, which doesn’t include ignoring stats of other countries and doesn’t have an agenda to paint all Indians as evil Hindus. You are just silly – now please continue with your vitriol.
And lol at comparing INdia’s issues of development with Japan. A country that is so homogenous and tiny compared to one of the most populated places on earth and one the most diverse in religion, culture,ethnicity, etc. places on earth; I’d love to see the US come in and write our constitution trying to accomodate the caste issues, religious issues, language and regional issues, environmental. In the meantime dear Prema, as you praise Imperial Japan, just be glad you weren’t one of their subjects in that period. No, I’ll take Ashoka’s enlightenment anyday.
NaraVara wrote:
Typically heartless hindutva response. The massive hunger problem in India would be considered a crisis requiring immediate solutions by any civilized nation with a modicum of conscience, yet to these fake hindu “nationalists” its no big deal at all! See how callous these folks are, as long its not them or their kin who are going hungry. What right do people like you have to call yourselves nationalists? You are the true enemies of India, not the whites you keep blaming.
Shameless dishonesty and deceit. You need to read objective history not the hindutva lies that your kind keeps repeating like parrots. Observe the lies folks: its the whites who are responsible for not only the hunger and poverty in India, but also for casteism, misogyny and child slavery! Last time I checked widow burning, the most vicious form of misogyny, was banned by the British colonials over the strenuous objections of brahmins who railed against this interference in their “religious” customs.
Thats really funny coming from someone who keeps blaming whites for all of India’s social and economic problems. According to you hindus are such a stupid, spineless, inferior race that a handful of white englishmen succeeded in brainwashing them so thoroughly that even after 60 years of independence they remain helpless to change themselves! Get real.
Dialogue like this in the Times of India:
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/opinions/3979601.cms
I am gratified to see that for the first time in my experience the majority of commenters reject the lies, delusions and selfishness of your ilk.
This movie and others like it that are bound to follow will attract an international audience leading to an international dialogue, which is very necessary to begin the process of creating international pressure to force India to do the right thing to its own citizens.
I wonder why this particular Western Orientalist representation of India is causing so much anguish. Born into Brothels, I think, is a much more excoriating look at the endemic and systematic degradation of Indians. The fact that it is a White girl who is the savior, of sorts, in that documentary, makes it even more of a masturbatory White Man’s Burden story than Slumdog Millionaire. I found Born into Brothels (just the title is an indictment of Hindu caste system) to be much, much, much more disturbing.
199 · Slumdog said
Who doesn’t remember Hotel Rwanda fixing the conflict between Rwanda sponsored Hutus and the Tutsis in Congo? The war at the box-office otally eliminated the need to send even a reasonable peace keeping force. Not to mention Syriana’s searing impact on the nexus of globalization, petrodollars, and terrorism. I think the impact lasted for at least one entire cycle of cocktail parties.
ha,ha,ha!
Let’s not forget Mississipi Masala ended racial tension between African Ams and indians.
Fire totally ended the stigma of lesbian love in India.
Water made widowship sexy.
The Spike Lee Levee film on New Orleans surely will end racial prejudice in this country.
Goodfellas made everyone realize crime doesn’t pay and is ending gang and mafia enrollment.
Kandahar freed the women of Afghanistan from the travesty’s of patriarchy.
In all honesty though, a good film can be thought-provoking and help induce social change just don’t have some lying loony like Prema do pr – that will end any good film’s authenticity and good intentions.
198 · Slumdog said
It’s funny because not a single sentence in here aside from the British banning of Sati actually attempts to refute anything I’ve said. Fair enough. If you can’t support your arguments go on closing your ears.
And for the record, yes I do think a lot of Hindus are spineless cowards who have allowed foreigners to write their history for them and gleefully parrot those racist talking points in a pathetic attempt to seek approval from the abusive guardian. But me, who is actually looking for solutions to problems that work am the heartless one while you who have nothing to contribute but racism and whining are the oh, so enlightened model of compassion. Spare me the crap.
BiB doesn’t have a large throng of people (Indian and non) going around talking as if it that kind of situation is all there is to India. Moreover, BiB is a legitimately honest look at a serious issue. It’s something that merits intelligent discussion in a way that Slumdog millionaire isn’t.
I actually liked Slumdog Millionaire. It’s a great movie for what it is, that is an escapist fantasy that paints an idealistic Horatio Alger story (except here the triumph isn’t “making it” so much as finding the love of his life.) The cinematography was excellent and the soundtrack, though not Rahman’s best, was pretty good. What I don’t like is people watching this movie and acting as if they’re experts on what life is like in India.
Thank you to the last few commenters for keeping it on topic. The topic is a movie, in case some of you have forgotten.
I’m an American born Desi and I really liked the movie. I took my Indian-born parents to see it and they loved it. It’s been criticized as depicting Indian society as poor, backward, cruel and morally bankrupt. I find this particular criticism invalid. I’ve been to Mumbai. My father spent quite a bit of time in Mumbai. Neither I nor he felt it grossly misrepresented Mumbai. Sure, it doesn’t represent India in it’s entirety, but that’s not even the intention or subject matter of the film! Sure, it depicts a section of life in an Indian metropolis as cruel and morally bankrupt. But watch any Hollywood crime film, mobster film, or any one of the myriad crime dramas on T.V. They don’t depict Americans as cruel and morally bankrupt??? They are dramas that take place in an urban setting! And so does this film!! I’m not saying the film is not without flaws. The plot is absurdly far-fetched. I found Jamal character to be incongruous. As a boy, he’s depicted as a spunky, rambunctious child. As a young adult, he is quiet and sheepish. He didn’t seem like the same character. And how and where does he learn English? I could point out other things, but regardless, I still liked the movie and think it is is worthy of the accolades it has received.