"The soundtrack is outstanding. A.R Rahman orchestrated the score and M.I.A (Paper Planes) also contributes."
Slumdog Millionaire Danny Boyle has been one of the most creative and interesting directors of the last ten years but has gotten very little recognition during that time period. His films usually do moderately well at the box office and then develop a bigger fan base when released on DVD. Some of his works including Trainspotting and 28 Days Later are among the great genre films in recent years. Sooner or later Boyle was going to have a masterstroke and he now has it in Slumdog Millionaire. Jamal Malik (Dev Patel) is a kid from the slums of Mumbai who happened to become a contestant on the Indian version of Who Wants to be a Millionaire? On the show he answers every questions correctly leading up to the final question just as the show runs out of time. As he leaves the studio he is taken by the police on suspicion of cheating. Jamal explains to the authorities how he knew the answers to all the questions, describing his life story in the process. Every aspect of Slumdog Millionaire is excellent. The story is unique and crosses multiple genres like drama, comedy, romance and crime allowing for a wide range of emotions from the audience. There are no actors in the cast that you will be familiar with but the performances are exemplary, especially by the children that play a younger Jamal and his brother. Personally I have never seen any Bollywood films but the fact that Boyle was able to go into India and get the cast that he did proves that there is a lot of talent to be unveiled there. Perhaps this could lead to us seeing a more diversified crop of actors in mainstream films going forward and no Harold and Kumar is not what I am looking for. Anyway that is a topic for another day. Anthony Dod Mantle’s wonderfully crisp cinematography should be receiving technical accolades later this year. He had previously worked on 28 Days Later and The Last King of Scotland. The soundtrack is outstanding. A.R Rahman orchestrated the score and M.I.A (Paper Planes) also contributes. Of course Boyle always has fast paced and intense editing in his films and this one is no exception. There have been rumblings that Slumdog Millionaire will be this year’s Little Miss Sunshine or Juno. Interestingly enough all three movies are distributed by Fox Searchlight which is also releasing The Wrestler this year and is evidently a brilliantly run company both in terms of development and promotion. As to whether or not it’s this year’s Little Miss Sunshine or Juno I both agree and disagree. It will, or should be the film that gets nominated for awards and that no one saw coming a few months ago. It will not do as well at the box office as the other two movies because it lacks the star power. However it is better than both Little Miss Sunshine and Juno. If you ask me right now what the best film of 2008 is so far, I would say Slumdog Millionaire. Final answer. A+ http://mateostarrmovies.blogspot.com/2008/10/slumdog-millionaire.html
