Slumdog Millionaire
Academy Award × 8
Rent/Purchase
A teenager reflects on his life after being accused of cheating on the Indian version of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?".
What critics thought
Broadly acclaimed outside India, Slumdog Millionaire won over most critics with its kinetic energy and crowd-pleasing emotional sweep, though a vocal minority felt exactly those qualities were the problem — that Boyle's feel-good machinery glossed over the poverty it depicts and that the flashback-heavy structure drains momentum until the final act. The sharpest fault line runs between those who read the Bollywood-style exuberance as joyful confidence and those who saw it as a Western outsider romanticizing hardship.
“a breathless, exciting story, heartbreaking and exhilarating.”
Roger Ebert·Chicago Sun-Times
“a Hollywood-style romantic melodrama that delivers major studio satisfactions in an ultra-modern way”
Kenneth Turan·Los Angeles Times
“despite the extravagant drama and some demonstrations of the savagery meted out to India's street children, this is a cheerfully undemanding and unreflective film with a vision of India that, if not touristy exactly, is certainly an outsider's view; it depends for its full enjoyment on not being taken too seriously.”
Peter Bradshaw·The Guardian
“a noisy, sub-Dickens update on the romantic tramp's tale”
Eric Hynes·IndieWire
Genres
Crime, Drama, Romance
Cast & Crew
DirectorDanny Boyle
StarringDev Patel, Freida Pinto, Madhur Mittal, Anil Kapoor, Mahesh Manjrekar
ComposerA.R. Rahman
Slumdog Millionaire
Academy Award × 8
A teenager reflects on his life after being accused of cheating on the Indian version of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?".
What critics thought
Broadly acclaimed outside India, Slumdog Millionaire won over most critics with its kinetic energy and crowd-pleasing emotional sweep, though a vocal minority felt exactly those qualities were the problem — that Boyle's feel-good machinery glossed over the poverty it depicts and that the flashback-heavy structure drains momentum until the final act. The sharpest fault line runs between those who read the Bollywood-style exuberance as joyful confidence and those who saw it as a Western outsider romanticizing hardship.
“a breathless, exciting story, heartbreaking and exhilarating.”
Roger Ebert·Chicago Sun-Times
“a Hollywood-style romantic melodrama that delivers major studio satisfactions in an ultra-modern way”
Kenneth Turan·Los Angeles Times
“despite the extravagant drama and some demonstrations of the savagery meted out to India's street children, this is a cheerfully undemanding and unreflective film with a vision of India that, if not touristy exactly, is certainly an outsider's view; it depends for its full enjoyment on not being taken too seriously.”
Peter Bradshaw·The Guardian
“a noisy, sub-Dickens update on the romantic tramp's tale”
Eric Hynes·IndieWire
Genres
Crime, Drama, Romance
Cast & Crew
DirectorDanny Boyle
StarringDev Patel, Freida Pinto, Madhur Mittal, Anil Kapoor, Mahesh Manjrekar
ComposerA.R. Rahman
Rent/Purchase