Honestly, I’m perplexed by the range of reactions that Slumdog has elicited. I liked the movie, had a great time while I was watching it, adored the sound track and cinematography and thought the plot and acting were clichéd. But a week later, I would have forgotten the film if not for all the other hoopla surrounding it.
The core of the controversy seems to be whether the film is exploitative. Who gets exploited (slumdwellers, old India, new India) changes depending on who is levelling the accusation, but each time the claim is that the movie is somehow poverty pr0n.
The main broadside against the film was lobbed by Amitabh who said:
“if SM projects India as [a] third-world, dirty, underbelly developing nation and causes pain and disgust among nationalists and patriots, let it be known that a murky underbelly exists and thrives even in the most developed nations.” [link]
He later backpedaled, saying that the words were not his own, and that he had put them up merely to start a debate.
Similar criticism came from former ambassador (and Sree‘s dad) T P Sreenivasan, who saw the movie as undermining new India:
Having read the novel and seen the film, I cannot say that it has done more good than harm to India. This is not a matter of my wanting to shove the reality under the carpet… the film is exploitation of the novel, of Dharavi, of poverty, of Rahman, of India itself to titillate foreign audiences. It is the exploitation of the new curiosity about India’s success.Torture is internationally banned and the director of the film knew that India had not joined the global consensus against torture….The torture scenes do not add much to the story, but denigrates India even more than the slums do… As though the depiction of squalor, crime and cruelty is not enough, the film challenges India’s success. [link]
And an anonymous friend of mine summed up his discomfort with the film by saying:
Anything having to do with the third world that masses of white people go into paroxysms over is guilty until proven innocent…
On the other side are writers like Nirpal Dhaliwal in London, who parry Big B’s thrusts arguing that his discomfort with the movie is revealing:
Poor Indians, like those in Slumdog, do not constitute India’s “murky underbelly” as Bachchan moronically describes them. They, in fact, are the nation. Over 80% of Indians live on less than $2.50 (£1.70) a day; 40% on less than $1.25. A third of the world’s poorest people are Indian, as are 40% of all malnourished children. In Mumbai alone, 2.6 million children live on the street or in slums, and 400,000 work in prostitution. But these people are absent from mainstream Bollywood cinema. [link]
David Bordwell, whose extensive review is one of the best I’ve seen and who is actually fairly critical of the movie, responds to Bachchan by pointing out that the first world has also had to deal with depictions of its own poverty in film (and therefore that this is not a First vs. Third World issue):
Indian criticisms of the image of poverty in Slumdog remind me of reactions to Italian Neorealism from authorities concerned about Italy’s image abroad. The government undersecretary Giulio Andreotti claimed that films by Rossellini, De Sica, and others were “washing Italy’s dirty linen in public.”…Liberal American films of the Cold War period were sometimes castigated by members of Congress for playing into the hands of Soviet propagandists. It seems that there will always be people who consider films portraying social injustice to be too negative and failing to see the bright side of things, a side that can always be found if you look hard enough. [link]
It is bizarre to me that both detractors and supporters of the movie agree that the movie is realistic and disagree about whether this realism is shameful or productive. Sure, SDM was a “more realistic” portrayal of India than your average Bolly flick, but that’s like saying that it was a more realistic portrayal of India than Johnny Quest. To me, the film itself remained fantastical, escapist and Dickensian, more Oliver Twist than clever plot twist. I just can’t be bothered to get my chuddies in a knot over it. Show me a realistic portrayal of India, and then we’ll rumble.
Related: Sajaforum’s roundup, everything on Slumdog on UB, and of course, everything we’ve blogged on the topic
It doesn’t surprise me that there is a lot of negative sentiment about a critically acclaimed Indian movie. We are Indians after all, no one hates us more than ourselves. I’ll respond to some of the common criticisms.
I’m Indian and I just came back from visiting India. Those “stereotypes” people complain about are actually true in the vast majority of cases, as Nirpal Dhaliwal mentioned. It’s not director’s fault that they’re true. I went to Mumbai and saw Dharavi first-hand, then I saw the movie and was shocked at how well they captured it. The cinematography is so authentic that it makes even a slum look beautiful. Go look up Dharavi in Google Images and you’ll see how accurately they portrayed it. Most of the settings are completely untouched and filmed as-is. There is no “glossing” up or anything like what Bollywood does with their movies to cover up embarassing things about India, this is a 100% real and authentic portrayal. If you wanted something “positive”, go watch a brainless Bollywood movie.
And there are plenty of positive images of India too. The Taj looked beautiful and shown as-is without any gloss-overs. The overhead shot of developed Mumbai from the building was gorgeous. The scenes of them on the train traveling around the country were beautiful too.
It’s just 2 hours long! Have our attention spans really become so low that we can’t even do something for 2 hours anymore?
It’s called a plot device or more specifically a “MacGuffin”. Go look it up.
Well, most resident Indians sound like that since they grew up learning BRITISH English. It’s actually quite authentic. The only reason people think it’s bad or fake is because Indians are used to listening to Bollywood actors and their wannabe Americanized-accents. Case in point, the worst and least Indian-sounding accent was the one by Anil Kapoor, the game show host. He basically sounded like a white American.
Seriously? Latika was shown as a strong and brave girl and woman. Jamal and Salim’s mother was shown as a strong and loving mother who was probably raising them without a father. There weren’t even any other important females in the movie so this complaint is especially confusing.
Well of course not, it’s a damn MOVIE! Ever heard of suspension of disbelief? How many movies, even great ones, have we seen where the love between the protagonists makes absolutely no sense? A lot. How many movies have we seen with unrealistic plot holes or plot devices? Just about every one. It’s a MOVIE, not a documentary. The movie doesn’t pretend to be anything other than a masala flick with a Millionaire show plot device.
You know what’s overrated? The word “overrated”.
Blame Western movie-goers for falling in love with something they rarely get to see and understandable giving it all kinds of accolades. Don’t blame the movie-makers.
Oh and about all the nonsense about the word “slumdog”. We are a nation that constantly displays our racism against our own people. North vs. South. Light vs. Dark. Hindu vs. Muslim. Aryan vs. Dravidian. We still have the racist, sexist, regressive, and sometimes brutal caste system. We even call a whole group of people “untouchables”. Are we seriously going to make a big deal about the world “slumdog”?
Look in the mirror India!
Ennis – Thank you for this post! I have been feeling the same way as may people who did not like the film for many of the aforementioned reasons. Having been born and raised in the US I can still remember the 7th grade National Geographic films depicting India as “3rd” World and feeling as though this was a limited viewpoint based on what was shown in these propaganda documentaries, relative to what I would see when I would visit my family there. I am also left to wonder if the popularity of the film is due to the portrayal of the slums and its people in the context of the “3rd” World depicted in those old propaganda documentaries, fitting into a preconceived notion many people have about India. Or if people are really viewing these characters within a human context and this story being part of a larger human story about marginalization everywhere including the marginalization of poor people that goes on in the US?
vaat no name! you’ve upped the ante for long distance relationshipistas everywhere.
here’s some REAL desi-society for you. chesty punjabi kudis at a soiree felicitating freida in toronto.
sorry to be self-referential, but why is every guy in that series so dainty. a true son of the soil would be picking lint out of his kaccha with his left and eating a samosa with his right hand. i am. right now, and typing at the same time. ve move in mysterious vays.
squalor. what were they expecting from boyle? he may be many things, but milquetoast he aint. ah! for when ve vere young and vent rooting in the shitter [pliss dont be eating samosa when vaatching this. but feel free to pick lint. copiously].
True. It’s like they went through a Lonely Planet checklist instead of trying to capture the feel of the city. Oye Lucky! Lucky Oye! is a good Delhi movie. Slumdog is its touristy, superficial Bombay cousin.
Well, it made for good timepass, but I don’t understand why everyone is so excited about it. We’ve seen the plot a zillion times before in the Manmohan Desai/Deewar era, the music while good is certainly not close to Rahman’s best work (Jai Ho is actually quite terrible) and the actors are a mixed bag. So the question really is, why the acclaim?
There can be two explanations 1) That this is very new for Western audiences and Danny Bolyw has managed to package Bombay cinema to meet Western tastes 2) The same reason why books about Muslim women escaping from their cruel and exploitative husbands/families do really well.
What are you now? Maureen Dowd? 🙂
2 · Tushar said
Ah, the good ol’ two-wrongs-make-a-right-fallacy.
As far as I know the protests are by the slum dwellers themselves. They take offense to being called a “dog”, not an endearing term in India.
Protests against Indian made movies are also not uncommon. So, I don’t think this is a big deal.
10 · TTCUSM said
What wrongs?
I think the problem is most people in the West have limited exposure to India. I thought there were a lot of cliches in the film (the worst being the American tourist couple whose car got stripped – white man’s burden), and was not that original other than the way the story was told (how he knew the answers). It is yet another poverty film of India. There is so much more to India to all developing countries than their poverty.
Plus I cannot help but think if the main character was Hindu whose mother was killed by Muslims or Christians, or a Christian whose mother was killed by Muslims, it would not get the same acclaim. But somehow it is acceptable to show a child dressed up as Ram filled with hatred. This Hindu child was demonized, and was the only child in the film to be so demonized, and Ram was the only religious figure, not Jesus or Moses or Mohammed to be also demonized. The religious tensions in India and elsewhere are complex, and it is irresponsible to demonize one religion in the film. No religion should have been, or the bad side of all religions should have been.
The person who wrote about it being poverty porn was Alice Miles from the Times, “Shocked by Slumdog’s poverty porn; Danny Boyle’s film is sweeping up awards, but it’s wrong to revel in the misery of India’s children” http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/alice_miles/article5511650.ece
“Show me a realistic portrayal of India, and then we’ll rumble.”
Absolutely, absolutely, absolutely. This movie felt like a slick bollywood movie packaged for the West. I have to say, though, it tickles me to no end to see bollywood moves on an oscars stage. Bravo for A.R. Rahman at least.
Torture is internationally banned and the director of the film knew that India had not joined the global consensus against torture….The torture scenes do not add much to the story, but denigrates India even more than the slums do
I think that torture clip in the movie denigrates aspects of west’s war on terror by and makes a strong case for Obama’s anti-torture policy.
Ugh. I’m really sick of everyone – EVERYONE – bashing this film because it is apparently too shallow, too cliched, too escapist, not realistic enough, badly acted out, blah blah blah blah. There was little else but happy praise until the film’s hype swelled and suddenly everybody was coming out with knives to deflate the balloon. I have heard almost nothing but whining and criticism since Slumdog started gaining momentum in January, and especially after it won those Golden Globes.
So it has a fantastic plot. Why does that bother people so much? At least it’s a plausible fantastic plot, and it’s optimistic and spirited and beautifully written. Beautifully written. The actors, especially the kids and the cops, were absolutely brilliant, and I think Dev Patel did a great job too (though it’s quite fashionable to deride his performance, I’ve noticed).
The first comment was correct when it said that Indians are the most self-critical people around; Amitabh Bachchan is an idiot, and I’m pretty sure he changed his tune only after he saw Jamal jumping into a pool of feces for his sake. I think that the Indian criticisms are both unfair and a little embarrassing. However, I would hesitate to quote Nirpal Dhaliwal. I read that piece he wrote for the Guardian, and frankly, I thought it was wankery. He went into the other extreme, viciously denouncing Bollywood and claiming it was incapable of producing movies as good as the West, and that was why it was cribbing about Slumdog Millionaire. His arrogance and ignorance were really annoying, because Bollywood has different subgenres and does produce different kinds of movies, and his comments were both uninformed and insulting in many instances.
But “these people are absent” not in Indian cinema (not Bollywood you vandal) like Dhaliwal moronically describes it. The Indian cinema industry (which consists of much more than the Bombay based Indian film industry) consists of the most part of daily wage earners, 100s of whom have made it from obscurity to stardom. Such as Latika like chorus line extra who made it to comedienne and then leading lady in Hindi cinema, or Vadivel one of the hottest stars in Tamizh cinema who made it from the streets to stardom. It happens all the time. And that is why Indian film-makers don’t go overboard with poverty, because they know it all, having experienced it first hand. It is probably in the fitness of things that Slumdog isn’t doing particularly well in India. I don’t see too many Indians (except of course the gleeful available on the cheap collaborators) who can had for tuppence coming away impressed with a poorly made and scripted movie that is as realistic as penguins in the Sahara.
This is cultural vandalism. Wonder why Manoj Night Shyamalan doesn’t make a movie like this? Probably because he works with Vidyakar of Udavum Karangal.
Isn’t it funny that the same Rahman who scored Lagaan was not even nominated for a single song for his Lagaan some years ago, whereas now when he works with a vilayati guy (I say that deliberately) and scores a run of the mill number he earns an Oscar?
And what cheap shots! Amitabh has never once on “Millionaire” made fun of his audience or participants. If anything it is the obnoxious Shahrukh Khan who sa host has made fun of people’s names their calling and their answers.
This is a gratuitous insult on the face of Indian cinema and its fans, and comes close to a few other eminently forgettable peices of trash such as Louis Malle’s and Lapierre’s “City of Joy.”
Nothing has changed since the days of the East India Company it would seem. Then a few tinpots could be had trifles to let down their own, and hand over vast tracts of land to thugs like Clive. Today similarly Indian artistes can be had for small change and a trip to the Oscar red carpet to trash their own folk. White man’s burden – it continues. Only this time it’s been cast in politically correct clothes.
Why is SDM insulting to India? Is Oliver Twist insulting to Brits? Do you think that the British of the time should have shouted down Dickens for embarrassing England?
That is moronic of Dhaliwal. For all the copying that goes on in Indian movies, Indian movie goers don’t give a damn whether their movie is Indian or foreign. The Indian movie goer is quite eclectic and will give anything a fair chance. And the Indian movie goer watches Indian movies because they like it, and movies like that get made because they are popular and make money. Or else in this age of piracy and youtube, Indian movies should have died out. And American film companies should not have been trying to make Indian style movies. So Dhaliwal can moronically hold forth on the safe pages of the Guardian or join battle out here if he’s got the fortitude. And Amitabh taking exception to that unasked for insult in S.Millionaire? Absolutely justified. This is a guy who has become the star he is because of respecting his fans and putting his life in danger to enact all sorts of stunts (Coolie anyone?) He has been almost bankrupt and clawed back to success because of his fans, whom he never fails to thank. To depict him as some sort of king in the sky is to take a cheap and viciously dishonest shot. I guess it takes a blighty to act really cheap, and an underling like Dhaliwal to speak up for him?
And for heaven’s sake can we stop talking about how realistic this mediocre piece of trash is? Police torture? Antha (Kannada) remade as “Meri Awaaz Suno” >25 years back had some of the most horrific scenes of torture – Ardh Satya had it, why there are entire films that parody, and criticise the police in India. But then there’s a big difference, these movies are made in India by Indians, so I guess they can never be as good as a film by a great big guy from the sky from UK who jets in to make a movie about us!
yes, there are no gay people in iran.
you can say that you dislike ‘sm’ for several reasons. but your line of reason baffles me. if ‘x’ movie despicts torture well, it doesn’t mean that ‘y’ movie made 25 years later can also provides useful commentary on that same phenomenon. practically, every bollyfilm is made on ‘boy-meets-girl’ variation. some are good, some aren’t. some are technically accomplished, others aren’t. for every ‘golmaal’ (amol palekar version), there is a ‘mohabbatein.’ also indian voices on desi issues are feted abroad, provided they are well-made, cf. salaam bombay. it is the bollymachine that has actively sought to muffle new voices and discourage innovation (as ‘luck by chance,’ bollywood commentary from within captures nicely). let’s be honest about our own limitations. several technical talents exist in india, but they need money and audience acceptance to produce an influential corpus of work. and in the past couple years, i’ve been astonished by movies being made in desh. sure, some of them are imperfect, but many of them are original voices who’ve accomplished this by taking on great personal financial and professional risks: omkara, maqbool, manorama six feet under, luck by chance, a wednesday, khosla ka ghosla, oye lucky lucky oye (great commentary on crime, poverty, and youth btw), dev d. and no doubt, there must be auteurs in regional cinema that i have missed. the change is coming. and we will do better in conversation with world cinema, rather than being insular, insecure, and superior (see navdeep singh’s interview on a blog called ‘chasing iamb’). anurag kashyap and danny boyle, for instance, discussed their movies with each other as they were filming. and enriched their product for it. kashyap educated boyle on seminal works in indian cinema, and boyle instructed kashyap on cinematography and shooting drug use aesthetically.
it is worse to be in denial about it. from times of india:
only a publication-hungry provocateur would claim boyle is ‘revelling in the misery of india’s children.’ you can have quibbles with the movie, but this is downright malicious.
are foreign film entries eligible in other categories? this is an honest question, jyotsana. one i believe should be answered, so that your assertion holds.
i fail to see how SDM “trashes” india. if you believe that, then the same criticism applies to ‘mother india’ or ‘satya’ or ‘dev d.’ btw, does ‘crash’ trash america? what trashes india, IMO, is our own film-makers — many of whom genuinely believe that indians do not wish to see the lives of their fellow citizens on screen. are we, as a nation, so lacking in empathy? i find it very insulting when inept producers and directors blame only the audience for their inability to deliver a quality product. i refuse to believe that indian audiences will not accept anything except syrupy teeny-bopper romances, awful capers, and item numbers.
Your baffles baffle me. Is showing torture on the Indian screen something new? No. Do Indians think that police don’t torture suspects? No. Do Indians labour under the illusion that police are angels with wings? No. We are forgetting Maniratnam’s Nayakan aren’t we? Salaam Bombay isn’t an Indian voice abroad, it is a foreign peephole looking in at India. I didn’t say that, a v. famous art film maker in Bombay said that. Portmanteau, every Indian film has boy-meets-girl because have you thought it happens all the time? So the Indian movie business suppresses talent? And other film industries nurture it? You know what it is hard to get in and make it in any movie industry, anywhere. And every film-maker in India craves commercial success, just about no one disdains it unless they make junk. Ray’s films even today draw big crowds. And you will never find Govind Nihalani blaming the market for his failures, because he will tell you that if he could have made another Ardh Satya, success would have been his.
Insular and insecure and Indian cinema? That’s a joke!
what a model of civic virtue and courtly grace. mr. bachchan pretends to be a farmer to acquire land, and is probably embroiled in secret schemes with the great amar singh. as long as you have great manners, stardom, and friends in high places, you can engage in all manner of shady deals, fake modesty, and malicious posturing. no one dare call you out on it because god knows, your fans or goonda friends will show them a good time.
jysotsana, just because one movie shows torture 25 years ago, doesn’t mean a new movie that shows it is automatically unoriginal. well, i think nair’s sensibilities are better for her foreign education (she speaks very fondly for her education in film-making at harvard, where she was exposed to movies from all over the world). the person who criticized nair as a ‘foreign’ peephole betrays insecurity. art is not disqualified from greatness because the artist is born with the wrong passport. boyle should be criticized for his movie’s merits and flaws, not because he is foreign. i hold ratnam and scorcese to the same standards; let their movies speak for them, not their nationalities.
“So the Indian movie business suppresses talent? “
i didn’t say that, zoya akhtar did 😉
“And every film-maker in India craves commercial success, just about no one disdains it unless they make junk”
i’m not denying that. but a lot of desi film-makers make a shitty movie, and say that it doesn’t work, because it’s edgy; or they a make a shitty movie (that eventually fails) and say that the audience won’t accept anything except escapist fantasies. and even if boyle’s movie is a commercial success, we can’t discount the possibility that it is junk. i don’t think so; i think it’s an entertaining fable, much like desi movies of yore. i can’t help but think that ‘deewar’ and its two-brother morality tale was an influence.
Why is everyone calling this an indian movie and a Bollywood movie. I don’t even think thats true. Isn’t it a british film?
Sorry if this has been said before, but why couldn’t A.R. Rahman correct the pronunciation of his own name, i know he’s all about love but c’mon dude….and all the presenters have to do is pronounce the winner’s name right…wasn’t someone asked how his name was to be pronounced.
I don’t understand the cinema verite/realism debate….SM was a novel idea/film, a dickensian bollywodish fairytale set in present day Bombay where half the people of that city live on the streets. Underbelly, my azz. I think Amitabji is a lil piffed he wasn’t asked to do the role and is resentful at all the attention the movie and Anilji is getting.
Yes, Boyle said so himself. [link]
“Why is everyone calling this an indian movie and a Bollywood movie. I don’t even think thats true. Isn’t it a british film?”
why do we have to attribute nationalities to films that bear imprints from all over? and why is it a useful exercise? it is certainly not a bollywood movie. but it is a movie made by an irish director, an english writer (who adapted an indian novel), an american film company, an indian co-director, an ensemble cast, and a multinational crew.
if we can have transnational/multinational corporations, then why can’t we have transnational films (exemplified by movies like ‘sm,’ ‘monsoon wedding,’ and the execrable ‘bride and prejudice’)?
also: i’ve never heard anybody describe it as a ‘bollywood film,’ only ‘inspired’ by hindi cinema.
as Rachman sez, “mere paas maan hai”, and I died and vent to heawen.
Meera Nair’s has made 1.5 good movies – a 0.25 success with Mississippi Masala and a 1.25 success with Namesake. The 1st one was autobiographically inspired, and the 2nd one is based on a good plot, by a good author. The rest of her work is eminently forgettable, which is why apart from the few it titilates, her films have done poorly in India.
So it is Zoya Akhtar’s word against Lawrence D’Souza’s? The former is a champion scriptwriter’s daughter who has her first project delivered on a platter, while the latter is a another one of those obscure extras who rose through the ranks to make “Saajan” a blockbuster hit starring Salman Khan years ago. Nobody says it is easy, it is a struggle. Ask Ilayaraja, a maali who labored on rich man’s plantation, whose mother Ponnuthaayi, shushed him when he expressed a desire to learn music. That’s the same man who went on to compose the 1st symphony by an Indian. Everyone who makes it in the Indian movies will tell you it was hard, hit or miss, make or break, but no one will tell you that the industry suppresses talent. Maybe it does, but they will tell you that in their case it did not. They make it a point to thank the fans and the many who have helped them.
This is a Bollywood film, Bollywood as in parody, as in vicious caricature. Just as the term Bollywood reduces a vastly rich and vibrant film culture in >10 languages to a cheap knock-off of a suburb of LA, SDM, reduces Indian cinema to a few snapshots of smut. It is comforting to know that the only good people in India are the few goras who strut around. And the names? Boyle the jackass seems to have picked them out of a phone-book. The child exploiting gang is led by a Mammen and Punnose – Mallu Christian names both, for those who didn’t figure it. Kidnappers in the slums usually get lynched. Only in Boyle’s escapist smut do they get away.
“art is not disqualified from greatness because the artist is born with the wrong passport.” You are right. It is disqualified when it is trashy, cliched, jaded and predictable, as in Monsoon Wedding or Salaam Bombay.
OK now for intense slum movies. Jayakanthan’s “Unnai Pol Oruvan” in Tamizh made in the late ’60s is a grim and unrelenting tale about a slumdog, based on an origianl story by Jayakanthan himself. The movie was made on a set, and was a hard watch, v. hard hitting. For all his labours Jayakanthan won only the best regional film award in the National Awards. The movie ran for about a week in the halls, and that was it. Jayakanthan has had to wait for years for success although he is a very controversial and popular author. He won a long overdue Jnanapith in 2002.
The next, and definitely India’s best slum movie, was “Pasi” – Hunger, by Durai, in the late ’70s. This one starred the late Shobha, who was married to Balu Mahendra when she took her life. Shobha won the National Best Actress award for her portrayal of a beggar from the slums. Pasi was shot in the real slums of Madras, and was a big hit. Inspired by Pasi, the late Robin Dharmaraj made Chakra, starring Smita Patil and Naseeruddin Shah among others. Shah in an unforgettable role as a terminally ill person makes that great line, “A man’s life is a all about the cravings of the stomach and what lies a few inches below.” Chakra was shot on specially constructed setts because after a few days of live shoots, the crew found it impossible to maintain order on the sets.
Well but then who wants to take the trouble to watch Indian cinema when foreign made smut purporting to be Indian can be had the way we want it. Not so long ago we say a trashy kitschy Bombay Dreams which cannot ever be mistaken for Shree 420 even by the most addlepated ass. And now we have SMD. So it is Indian cinema that must shed its “insularity” and “insecurity”? Not ill-read, misinformed foreign film-makers, who at one time wouldn’t cast Kabir Bedi either as an exotic or even as an Indian. So we will remain native informants, jokers on call, puppets for hire, and ji huzoors and koi hais. Because that is the way it is, it is written.
Slumdog is the new macaca.
M. Nam
“So it is Zoya Akhtar’s word against Lawrence D’Souza’s?” no, it was saying that i don’t like the “x says..” way of argumentation. i was being facetious. hence, the emoticon. saajan, is what sucks, btw (nair, at least, can be proud of a couple of her works). danny boyle didn’t have it easy either (and he isn’t ill-read or misinformed). slumdog was struggling to find us distributors. i don’t agree with your pov about monsoon wedding either. i have pointed to examples where indian moviemakers are not insular (see comment # ‘on kashyap, singh, bannerjee, and bharadwaj ). ray, the great you point to, was influenced by ‘the bicycle thief to make movies at comparatively late age. he was consistently influenced by the work of renoir and truffaut. slumdog is supposed to be an entertainer (most reviews call it a modern day fairy tale, is that indicative enough for you?), not a hard-hitting documentary about the slums of india. amitabh bachhan’s diatribe, to me, sounded like sour grapes. so does lawrence d’souza’s. kareena kapoor said recently that she wouldn’t want to work in foreign movies because she’d lose her star status during filimg (insecure and insular. you bet!).
18 · Ennis said
I feel the last part of the question should be, Do you think the British of the time would have shouted and discussed like this if Maniratnam had made that movie about them at that time?
“native informants, jokers on call, puppets for hire, and ji huzoors and koi hais.”
they could just be indians who have a different pov than you. but easier to slander and smear them like this. easier to use derogatory adjectives. easier to call names.
“Kidnappers in the slums usually get lynched.”
see the nithari case. kidnappers can also take a long time to be caught in the slums. stop romanticizing. and stop with slamming slumdog because it’s not a documentary. there are far sounder grounds to criticize that movie.
I should have quoted more of Amitabh’s objection. Much of it wasn’t against Slumdog, but against arthouse cinema in general, especially Satyajit Ray:
Sounds to me like Amitabh thinks of himself as an auteur at the level of Ray and doesn’t understand why he hasn’t received similar accolades; he wants to elevate perceptions of the mass market Bolly product he puts out so that people see it as being as artistic as Ray’s work.
saa —
The film was based on an Indian novel and had an Indian co-director, Indian cameramen, a largely Indian cast, Indians doing the sound track (which was my favorite part of the movie), etc. It’s a joint product, not a totally firangi perspective.
Films are made in America about its underbelly all the time – both by domestic and foreign film makers. I’m puzzled when people say “How would Americans feel if somebody made a film about American poverty?” There’s much less poverty in America, and it’s far better depicted on the big screen, both by Americans and non-Americans.
“Do you think the British of the time would have shouted and discussed like this if Maniratnam had made that movie about them at that time?”
they might have; but that would have shown them to be a reactive, defensive people. it is ok to criticize boyle if you feel he is misleading or way off the work or disrespectful (given the general suspension of disbelief that you muster for movies) or a bad artist. not ok to criticize him just because he is irish. for instance, if i wrote a solid research paper about corruption in the US, should people discount my work because I am an Indian citizen?
41 · Ennis said
I am not against a foreigner making a movie about slum. Personally I thought the movie was extremely mediocre, the poor guy from slum hits it big with cool music blasting in the background. That is like 80% of Indian movie. Though the direction was good. I just pointed out that if Maniratnam had made such a movie and it received 7 oscars, the same type of discussion would be happening with Brits, instead of actually fixing the problems that cause slums, but thats another story.
41 · Ennis said
Watch another oscar entry “Frozen River”. It is all about American White Poverty and morals. It is a very good work of a movie. Not an attempt to destroy or build image of America.
Do you think that Vikas Swarup, a diplomat, was intending to destroy India when he wrote Q&A?
Why do people think this movie is an attempt to destroy the image of India? I think most of the protests are misplaced. I think the movie is pretty accurate in its description of a lot of things. I am not sure if it is a movie worthy of all the adulation.
“Why do people think this movie is an attempt to destroy the image of India? I think most of the protests are misplaced. I think the movie is pretty accurate in its description of a lot of things. I am not sure if it is a movie worthy of all the adulation.”
what a sensible comment 🙂 seconded!
Portmanteau,
When Indians make movies set in the West or involving Westerners, they manage to swing a few obscure stand-ins at best. George Clooney didn’t play the doctor in “Kal Ho Na Ho”. And Hugh Grant didn’t play the British administrator in Lagaan. So there’s a good reason why Kareena Kapoor won’t play a piece of furniture in some Hollywood potboiler to lend local colour and toss a few lines for laughs. She is a star and will demand her price. Take it or leave it. Amitabh a UN Goodwill Ambassador who is the most popular film star in the world (and best known if you throw in the US and Canada), who has acted in just about every role imaginable, hammed many and delivered some unforgettable performances, is not going to play some cheesy role written by some ignorant director. That’s standing firm on status. If Hollywood wants to make a movie with top billed Indian stars, they had better pay top dollar, and work at the stars’ terms. That is v. reasonable. It is the rare Indian film maker who hasn’t expressed his appreciation or tribute to some foreign film maker. Manmohan Desai praised William Wyler and Raj Kapoor likewise for Chaplain, and a host of others. A whole lot of them have no qualms admitting where they ripped a theme off from when they do it. But then the self same filmmakers do make up stuff on their own too, and they aren’t being insular when they do it. Catering to the maddeningly diverse Indian audience is a full time job, and about 15 times harder than making the standard Hollywood potboiler even if it is creepy stuff starring slime masked wooden dolls like Brad Pitt in Benjamin Button…Indian cinema is an art form in its own right and its own sources of inspiration, and its own audience. Stop generalizing from Nithari, and read the papers more often, or talk to a guy who has lived cheek by jowl to a large slum – aka me.
Ennis, read Amitabh again, he is criticising the argument, and speaking up not for himself, but the auteurs of days gone by, the men and women of the Indian movies of the 50s and 60s. Amitabh has never panned Ray and has a few times expressed regret for not having had a chance to work with him. In his pre-movie days, Amitabh as a yuppie in Calcutta was active on the stage in Bangla, English and Hindi, and knows the work of Ray and Ghatak very well. The same criticism is valid considering how Hollywood treats Indian non-mainstream cinema. Adoor Gopalakrishnan, Kumar Shahani, or Aravindan have never come up for notice. Maybe because unlike Boyle they explore other issues that are supposed to be the domain of Western cultural vandals. Adoor who won a native informantsFilm Institute honour for his Elippathayam (Rat Trap) and the late Aravindan (the masterpiece Chiambaram) explore identity, development, and several such themes. Aravindan’s Chidambaram explores violence, guilt and redemption in very non-Western ways, only as an Indian can. But then our duty is not to think, question, or put forward theories from our own tradition. If we have a dyslexic, he must be treated by some doctor from the West not a sympathetic Indian teacher at a kindly school in Panchgani. Because remember we Indians are simply native informants, with no mind of our own. We have no agency or capability to change ourselves. Thanks to Mylan for the documentary on Dr. Singh and his treatment of Pinky’s cleft lip. But then is this is the first documentary on an Indian NGO? Haven’t there been docs on Baba Amte? But then I guess since it wasn’t made by a Westerner, off with it.
Ennis generally that is what you should expect to happen. The West doesn’t take kindly to inspectors from foreign shores. I learned to pipe down about the US Constitution at work, because a lot of people didn’t like me correcting them. This doesn’t happen all the time or even enough, but it does.
Neetu @ 14:
Yes. Even I was surprised and unprepared for the rush of emotions that overtook me when I watched Rahman sing. And say a few words in Tamil.
And then it hit me: Wow. Finally, a day has dawned in which a Tamilian is (OK, two South Indians are) potentially bigger in India than that Bachchan trinity trash. Sweet.
“So there’s a good reason why Kareena Kapoor won’t play a piece of furniture in some Hollywood potboiler to lend local colour and toss a few lines for laughs.”
naseerudin shah and om puri have worked in small roles and managed to make an impact. shah specifically said that he was willing to take a drop in status about touring with shakespeare’s globe theater because he cared about honing his craft. kapoor is not offered this roles because her skillz and looks don’t translate in comparison to herrival ms. rai or art house hotties like ms. dharkar. and i say this as an admirer of ms. kapoor; she demands equal starpower and money wrt to leading men.
“Stop generalizing from Nithari, and read the papers more often, or talk to a guy who has lived cheek by jowl to a large slum – aka me.” well, those things are true of me and at least 40% of other sepia commentators. i hate to engage with you because of your tone and ad hominem remarks and your presumed superiority and sagacity. really, lawrence d’souza is quite mediocre, even if he is to be commended for his rise from poverty.
you can dismiss pinky (i won’t because i haven’t seen it); i’ve seen great docs from india (‘amrit beej,’ by meera dewan, which had a superb soundtrack or valmik thapar’s and bedi brothers’ several excellent wildlife documentaries). the reason these fail to succeed is because of a lack of funding and marketing push, which these film-makers will tell you themselves. at least, back in the day, NFDC used to dispense some funds. but today the state of neglect is such that the prints of the movies it produced are irretrievably destroyed. kamal haasan said on the news tonight that hopefully ‘slumdog’ will change perceptions of producers and distributors to some extent. his exact words, ‘india need to give quality cinema the respect it deserves.’ the fact that indian auteurs fail is our failing, not to be attributed to the marketing smarts of western directors or better funding opportunities in the west (CBC, BBC etc). there is also recognition of india of our inability to promote and preserve indigenous cinema; osian (http://220.226.203.134/filmhouse/filmhouse.php) is attempting to remedy this by setting up a museum, an archive, a film fest, and an associated production house. the government tried to do this but failed badly last year as post-mortems of the goa film fest indicate.
yes indian film-making is an artform in its right. but i just don’t buy that it is more difficult to make movies here. people struggle in LA, just as they do in bombay. for one, the audience is highly segmented in desh; this allows director some insurance. several low-budget ‘b and c’ movies release only in what is called the ‘interiors.’ multiplex movies are a genre unto themselves. same is true of the US too. indie movies are not given a wide release unless they prove themselves first, either through word-of-mouth or post-oscars or post-sundance etc.