DOUBLE TAKE
“SLUMDOG” was coined by script wright Simon Beaufoy to describe people living in the legendary squalor of third world metropolitan boomtowns and contrast it with the term “Millionaire” and all that such a prominent societal status entails with its glittery albeit empty glamor. Based on Vikas Swarup’s ingenious debut novel Q&A, Beaufoy could have entitled the movie “Tea Server” (Indian term “chai walla” is used as a derogatory label on the protagonist), which is the role that Jamal Malik portrays at the time he joins the television gameshow “Who wants to be a millionaire?” But labeling a person “tea server” will not capture the essence of characters portrayed. The protagonists are all slumdogs, more particularly people who have lived like stray dogs under impoverished conditions and exposed to racial crime, religious pogroms, prostitution and child enslavement all within the setting of a growing urban metropolis that provides technological advancement, irrepresible enterpreneurship and celebrity obsession.
The movie commences with the torture of slumdog Jamal Malik by police interrogators. TV host Prem Kumar cannot believe that an uneducated, eighteen-year-old slumdog serving tea at a call center has been able to reach the gameshow’s final stage, when even highly educated barristers and professors are not able to go beyond the stage of sixty thousand rupees. Kumar has Malik arrested before he will be asked the last question for the grand prize of twenty million rupees. But after being beaten to a pulp, half-drowned in a toilet, and electrocuted to near death, Malik simply states: “I knew the answers.” No cheating happened. Curious, the police investigators ask Malik to explain. Each trivia question is precipitated with an anecdote from Malik’s life experiences as he grows from a young child to a teenager.
The first query is about the most popular Indian actor, who Malik properly identifies. He tells how he was locked up by his irritable older brother in a public toilet with no cesspool while he was defecating. He hears a helicopter of an arriving actor and the slum people chanting out the actor’s name. Malik remembers the actor’s photo in his pocket, and in his enthusiasm, jumps into the fecal mountain under the toilet so he can secure the actor’s signature. The picture is signed. A second query is asked about what the Hindu God Rama holds in his hand. He remembers when his mother is killed during a religious pogrom. He runs away with his brother Salim and a young vagrant girl Latika. As they run away from the massacre of Muslims, he sees a child dressed as Rama in a neighborhood festival and clearly remembers the image of Rama holding a bow. He adds: “If it wasn’t for Rama and Allah, I’d still have a mother.” Another query is asked about the image on a one hundred American dollar bill. He answers Benjamin Franklin; he narrates receiving a hundred dollar bill from an American couple whose car was cannibalized then giving it to a mendicant friend, who had been blinded by a Fagin-like gangster surrealistically from Dickensian literature. The blind friend asks him who the person on the hundred dollar bill is, and Malik describes Benjamin Franklin.
The police wonder aloud: “What the hell can a slumdog possibly know?” But the police realize that the recounted bittersweet passages of Malik’s life experiences have specifically prepped him to win the big-time game show money. Yet he does not want the money. He just wanted to be seen on TV by Latika, the child whom he first saved from the slums, then from a prostitution den, and who had now grown up to be a beautiful woman but a mistress of a millionaire slumlord gangster. He knew that Latika had been watching the famous TV gameshow and wanted to communicate his whereabouts just in case she wanted to escape.
The movie captivates the vibrant pulse and verve of a confusing universe where anything is possible—where even dirt-poor orphans can stand on the precipice of extreme wealth and popularity and live or die. Entwined with the bristling underclass of the unwashed, the heartbreaking poverty and privation, the exploitation and enslavement of prostituted women and children, this love story between two wretched souls, in essence, celebrates the resilience of people, the power of knowledge, the vitality of human experience and the transcendental complexion and innocence of unconditional and reciprocal love.
Mumbai’s slumdog ambiance is not new. This nation has its equivalent heady smells of turmeric, fenugreek and cumin. It has its glitter of skyscrapers, stuffed with smelly corporate suits, and the rust of tin-roofed favelas. But it is from the unheard sounds of pain, of poverty, of hopelessness that people wish to escape. Lotto, charity sweepstakes, gameshows, noontime variety shows, police and military academies, crime fraternities—all these provide an escape. Some people achieve prominence, some notoriety, some become decent human beings finding their souls in this cruel world. Slumdog Millionaire captures the essence of this world.
ericfmallonga@yahoo.com
“SLUMDOG” was coined by script wright Simon Beaufoy to describe people living in the legendary squalor of third world metropolitan boomtowns and contrast it with the term “Millionaire” and all that such a prominent societal status entails with its glittery albeit empty glamor. Based on Vikas Swarup’s ingenious debut novel Q&A, Beaufoy could have entitled the movie “Tea Server” (Indian term “chai walla” is used as a derogatory label on the protagonist), which is the role that Jamal Malik portrays at the time he joins the television gameshow “Who wants to be a millionaire?” But labeling a person “tea server” will not capture the essence of characters portrayed. The protagonists are all slumdogs, more particularly people who have lived like stray dogs under impoverished conditions and exposed to racial crime, religious pogroms, prostitution and child enslavement all within the setting of a growing urban metropolis that provides technological advancement, irrepresible enterpreneurship and celebrity obsession.
The movie commences with the torture of slumdog Jamal Malik by police interrogators. TV host Prem Kumar cannot believe that an uneducated, eighteen-year-old slumdog serving tea at a call center has been able to reach the gameshow’s final stage, when even highly educated barristers and professors are not able to go beyond the stage of sixty thousand rupees. Kumar has Malik arrested before he will be asked the last question for the grand prize of twenty million rupees. But after being beaten to a pulp, half-drowned in a toilet, and electrocuted to near death, Malik simply states: “I knew the answers.” No cheating happened. Curious, the police investigators ask Malik to explain. Each trivia question is precipitated with an anecdote from Malik’s life experiences as he grows from a young child to a teenager.
The first query is about the most popular Indian actor, who Malik properly identifies. He tells how he was locked up by his irritable older brother in a public toilet with no cesspool while he was defecating. He hears a helicopter of an arriving actor and the slum people chanting out the actor’s name. Malik remembers the actor’s photo in his pocket, and in his enthusiasm, jumps into the fecal mountain under the toilet so he can secure the actor’s signature. The picture is signed. A second query is asked about what the Hindu God Rama holds in his hand. He remembers when his mother is killed during a religious pogrom. He runs away with his brother Salim and a young vagrant girl Latika. As they run away from the massacre of Muslims, he sees a child dressed as Rama in a neighborhood festival and clearly remembers the image of Rama holding a bow. He adds: “If it wasn’t for Rama and Allah, I’d still have a mother.” Another query is asked about the image on a one hundred American dollar bill. He answers Benjamin Franklin; he narrates receiving a hundred dollar bill from an American couple whose car was cannibalized then giving it to a mendicant friend, who had been blinded by a Fagin-like gangster surrealistically from Dickensian literature. The blind friend asks him who the person on the hundred dollar bill is, and Malik describes Benjamin Franklin.
The police wonder aloud: “What the hell can a slumdog possibly know?” But the police realize that the recounted bittersweet passages of Malik’s life experiences have specifically prepped him to win the big-time game show money. Yet he does not want the money. He just wanted to be seen on TV by Latika, the child whom he first saved from the slums, then from a prostitution den, and who had now grown up to be a beautiful woman but a mistress of a millionaire slumlord gangster. He knew that Latika had been watching the famous TV gameshow and wanted to communicate his whereabouts just in case she wanted to escape.
The movie captivates the vibrant pulse and verve of a confusing universe where anything is possible—where even dirt-poor orphans can stand on the precipice of extreme wealth and popularity and live or die. Entwined with the bristling underclass of the unwashed, the heartbreaking poverty and privation, the exploitation and enslavement of prostituted women and children, this love story between two wretched souls, in essence, celebrates the resilience of people, the power of knowledge, the vitality of human experience and the transcendental complexion and innocence of unconditional and reciprocal love.
Mumbai’s slumdog ambiance is not new. This nation has its equivalent heady smells of turmeric, fenugreek and cumin. It has its glitter of skyscrapers, stuffed with smelly corporate suits, and the rust of tin-roofed favelas. But it is from the unheard sounds of pain, of poverty, of hopelessness that people wish to escape. Lotto, charity sweepstakes, gameshows, noontime variety shows, police and military academies, crime fraternities—all these provide an escape. Some people achieve prominence, some notoriety, some become decent human beings finding their souls in this cruel world. Slumdog Millionaire captures the essence of this world.
ericfmallonga@yahoo.com
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