If you saw the Academy Award winning movie “Slumdog Millionaire,” you, like many others, including myself, truly found it an entertaining movie. I knew it was a controversial film here in India, primarily because it depicted a part of India that is not very flattering, the slums in the big cities of Mumbai, Delhi, Calcutta and many more. Being here in the country over the past week and hearing my friend’s different reactions to the movie, I can see their point.I remember many years ago when I lived in Kenya how that visitors always wanted to take pictures of the poor tribal’s. In all the years I was in Africa I never had one person say, “Hey, I’d like to get a picture of the rich Kenyans in Nairobi.” I guess it’s normal, but a Kenyan friend asked me why Americans only take pictures of the slums?
In a recent episode of a popular TV series the Amazing Race, one destination the team went to was Jaipur, India. The TV produces thought it was necessary to show the poor kids in the city eating from the trash bins and a close up of one of the contestants in tears, obviously distraught over the plight of poor children.
To be sure, there are many poor people in India and around the world and, for good and bad, many people exploit the images of the downtrodden for many things, including food relief, medical services, and schools and building their own non-profit coffers. The easiest ministry in the world to raise funds for is social work. Westerner’s fall all over themselves to help the poor (at a cost of $2500 for a two week excursion), to hand out rice and, of course, take lots of pictures of those they helped. (Interesting, they don’t often show the hotels or food they eat after they feed the poor in the slums).
Nevertheless, I still liked the movie. It had a good story line, well produced with great acting (at least from a layman’s point of view).
There is a bit of hypocrisy in Bollywood as many of their movies show a side of India that is out of reach for the masses. While not everyone in India lives in the slums, and even greater number will never reach middle class and, living like the super wealthy will only be attained, perhaps, in their next life or in another 100 reincarnations.
Movies, no matter the setting, are usually more fantasy than fact. Slumdog’s controversy was due to national pride and I get it. Reality doesn’t make for good movies so we are left with the polar opposites of the rich and famous and the poor slumdog’s. The happy middle of authenticity is somewhere tourists and movie produces don’t go.
2 comments:
Of course, the whole point of this movie was that a tea boy from the slums won on Millionaire. "Middle Class Millionaire" or "High Caste Millionaire" just wouldn't have had the same appeal. So they had to show the slums.
Good points, all around. I would suggest, though, that what makes SLUMDOG so good is that it is an example of good storytelling--the characters are rich, the plot is interesting, the end leaves the viewer with a distinct lingering emotion.
If we think of other movies that have been considered "good," we oftentimes see the same things being frowned on in this movie--the movie, CRASH, for instance. It showed the seedy side of humanity in the States, but like SLUMDOG, offered the option of hope. What about BRAVEHEART? The English are depicted as awful people; the heroic Scotts are brave but shown as very backwards and barbaric. Still, amazing storytelling. The movie, MONSOON WEDDING is an example of an Indian movie that showed more a more middle-to-upper class family, and it did very well, also. A good story has to have a point, though, and rarely do we find ANY movies from ANY country that shows just happy, happy life--stories require some kind of conflict and resolution to BE a story.
Where is the line between pride in one's country and being overly sensitive to any criticism? The truth is, every country is flawed. Every country has rich and poor, good and bad. And in this Easter season, I wonder if people in Israel ever get tired of THE PASSION OF THE CHRIST being a perception of their historic culture?
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