Two things fascinate me: the mafia and the slums of foreign countries. I suppose that with some intense psychotherapy I could deduce a link between my two obsessions. For now, however, I’m satisfied with watching as many movies about both as possible.

Movies about the slums exemplify how good I have it. After watching Slumdog Millionaire, I felt fortunate beyond belief. There were shoes on my feet! Food in my belly! Not exactly a smile on my face, but more of an awe-stricken, stunned look. Slumdog Millionaire was genius.

The story centers around Jamal Malik, a soft-spoken eighteen-year-old orphan who’s about to win twenty million Rupees on the Indian version of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? Unfortunately, Jamal’s humble beginnings provoke suspicion from the show’s announcer. When the show breaks for the night, Jamal is taken by the police for interrogation.

He’s being tortured. They’re yelling at him. “We know you cheated!” they’re shouting. He insists that he just knew the answers. Impossible, they say, that a “slumdog” could know so much. Jamal eventually tells the police his life story, and in doing so, he addresses how he knew the answer to each question.

Jamal spent his childhood in the overcrowded, poverty-ridden slums of Mumbai, India. He begins by recounting various experiences he had there: playing soccer, attending a jam-packed school, getting a Bollywood actor’s autograph.

One day, when Jamal is around seven, an extremist Hindu mob invades his slum and kills his mother. He’s left with no one but his older brother, Salim, who even at a young age displays controlling, violent qualities. The brothers find a third companion to live with – a girl named Latika. Together, the three struggle and steal to survive.

Slumdog Millionaire delves into both the psychology of its characters and the culture of Mumbai. At one point in the film, an American tourist witnesses Jamal being savagely beaten.

“You wanted to see the real India?” Jamal demands, “Well, this is it!”

Watching the movie, I repeated that question to myself. Did I really want to see this? Did I want to see the owner of an orphanage taking out a child’s eyes? Did I want to see rape, murder, filth, hate, etc.? The movie was certainly hard to watch at times, but its disturbing qualities felt real and not just for shock value.

Slumdog Millionaire portrayed Mumbai as a different world, completely removed from anything most Americans are used to. The director, Danny Boyle, says that this was intentional.

“[Mumbai has] too many people, not enough water, not enough anything,” said Boyle. “But it works. I mean, somehow there’s a pattern…Everything’s there you could ever need. Just an extraordinary place, one of those places mankind has designed to make the most intense experience of what it is to be a human
being.”

The psychology of Slumdog Millionaire’s characters is almost as disturbing as the culture of Mumbai’s slums. Jamal is this sweet-natured kid living amongst gangs, violence, and thugs. Salim is one of those thugs, and he takes a good amount of his aggression out on Jamal. Fate treats Latika poorly, and she transforms from being a loyal, friendly child to a resigned, beaten-upon woman.

Mix the films’ two themes together – culture and psychology – and you get Danny Boyle’s specialty. He is a master at depicting the psychology of a culture. His 1996 film Trainspotting reveals the bizarre thought-process behind Scotland’s heroin addicts.

Plotline aside, the visuals and music in Slumdog Millionaire make it worth watching. The movie is full of sweeping, intensely colorful, and dramatic images of Mumbai. And the music ranges from traditional Indian to “Paper Planes” by M.I.A.

Slumdog Millionaire offers new perspectives, cultural insight, and extreme entertainment value. It is sort of educational, yes, but it’s also two hours of being on the edge of your seat. It’s a love story, a drama, a comedy, and everything else. I can only say that about one other movie this year: WALL-E. I still think that WALL-E was fabulous, but this was simply phenomenal.