At last it has culminated with the ultimate triumph!
“Slumdog Millionaire”, which was nominated for 10 Academy Awards made a great run by sweeping away 8 Oscars, including that of the ‘Best Film’. Danny Boyle won the award for Best Director, Simon Beaufoy for Best Adapted Screenplay, Chris Dickens for film Editing, Anthony Dod Mantel for cinematography. Sound mixing award was shared with Rasool Pookutty, Ian Tapp and Richard Pryke.A R Rahman,the Indian musician won two awards- The Best Music Score Award and also for the Best Song shared with lyricist Gulzar.
For the past few months, there were also a lot of criticism and controversy going around this film on the view that the film depicted the lives of impoverished India, and also regarding the treatment of cast. It also faced criticism regarding the welfare aspects of its child actors. The director had to face accusations from some Indian media that his film was ‘poverty porn’. But according to Danny Boyle, it was an endeavor to capture Mumbai’s ‘Lust for life. The real controversy started with the comments in the blog of the legendary Indian actor Amitab Bachan. Following this; many more from the Indian film industry came forth with their critical views. Apart from the treatment of the film, issues also aroused that the compensation provided for the child actors were unfair.Another controversy was that the Co-Director of the film Mrs. Loveleen Tandan wasn’t included as co-nominee for the awards.This controversy even turned to the moods of Women Rights issue.
Leaving all these controversies apart and viewing it as a piece of art, the film is one of the riveting and the best portrayed films in recent times.”Slumdog Millionaire” which was actually filmed based on the novel of the Indian Author and diplomat Vikas Swarup named”Q&A”. The novel which delineated the exploitation and misery of orphans children, was exquisitely portrayed into the celluloid by the British Director- Danny Boyle.Even Vikas Swarup wouldn’t had expected such a beautiful and realistic illustration of his work.
The film beautifully renders major social aspects like Poverty, Orphan hood, riots, child harassment, under world, begging, brothel-houses, urbanization, cricket etc through a beautifully illustrated love story.
The story is of an 18 year old Jamal Malik’s journey from the slushy waste dump Slum in Mumbai to a hot seat of the Quiz Show -”Who wants to be a Millionaire” -The story moves with his progress in the show as he answers correctly. The reason how a primary school drop out Jamal Malik reaches the answers rightly, where even high qualified professionals failed to do, is the core of the film. Even the quiz master and the official law enforcement authorities turns suspicious on this. But,the answers were actually linked to incidents in the life of Jamal. The other protagonists in this film are Jamal’s brother Saleem and their childhood friend Lathika, for whom Jamal had a never ending adoration. The film conveys all the sufferings they had to face in their life with a realistic diction- the communal riots which made them orphans, the nightmarish world they had to spent with child beggars, the life in the streets and their striving for existence-even to an extend of killing for subsistence, the real picture of brothel houses, the rivalry, the separations, the longing despair etc.The film actually ends with the message that the ultimate triumph is only for true love and honesty.
Apart from Danny Boyle’s direction, the screen play of Simon Beaufoy, the editing of Chris Dickens, the cinematography of Anthony Dod Mantel and the music score of A.R Rahman were exemplary and can be attributed to the reason for this film to win such an applause. Another main highlight of the film is the lifelike performance of the actors, especially the child actors. The performance of Ayush Mahesh Khedekar, Tanay Chheda and, Dev Patel as Jamal in various ages, and Azharuddin Mohammed Ismail, Ashutosh Lobo Gajiwala and Madhur Mittal as Salim in various ages, Rubina Ali, Tanvi Ganesh Lonkar and Frieda Pinto as Lathika had contributed to a great extend in maintaining the realism of the film. The credit of their casting goes to the Co-director of the film Loveleen Tandan,especially for her finding of three kids who did the youngest part of the three central characters. In fact, Azharuddin Mohammed Ismail and Rubina Ali were actually found from the slums of Mumbai.
After winning a series of awards- five Critics’ Choice Awards, four Golden Globes, and seven BAFTA Awards, including Best Film-the big challenge for the film was to culminate with the ultimate triumph. And at last, Danny Boyle and his crew has successfully accomplished their task as it proved its true mettle on the D-day, sweeping away 8 Oscars.

The emperor’s new clothes! That’s “Slumdog Millionaire” for you… Five minutes into this celebrated patchwork of illogical clichés and you are struck by the jarring dialogues. The cumbersome delivery in a language which doesn’t come naturally to most of the actors sounds like someone scratching on walls with one’s finger nails; it ruins the possibility of a connection… Had this film been made by an Indian director, it would’ve been trashed as a rotting old hat, which literally stands out only because of its stench, but since the man making it happens to be from the West, we’re all left celebrating the emperor’s new clothes. The film borrows an undoubtedly interesting narrative style – from films like “City of God” – but then uses it to weave in a collection of clichés from the Third World’s underbelly for the viewing pleasure of a First World audience. The real slumdog in the movie is not the main protagonist but India as a whole… The makers and those celebrating this movie’s hard-to-spot brilliance are actually serving up India as the accidental millionaire, which in fact happens to be a slumdog… and like shameless fools we are gloating over its success without realising that it makes a caricature out of India.

The film does not have the sincerity and honesty of a “Salaam Bombay” or a “City of Joy” and nor does this slime covered fairy tale have the integrity or the rootedness of the above mentioned scripts, or even a “Shantaram” for that matter; the soundtrack and the performance of the child actors are the only bits in the film which live up to the hype. The real slumdogs who’ve hit the jackpot after wallowing in acres of human waste are the makers of this film who are now raking in millions while those court jesters who’ve critiqued the film and showered tributes and awards need to ask themselves why, scores of years after our independence, they still feel the need to suck up to the gora sahibs. It’s not a question of xenophobia… it’s definitely a well cinematographed film… but the film has no soul, especially after little Jamal has jumped off the train and become a teenager… The rest of the film is just a modern version of the West’s view of India where slums, slumdogs and Bollywoodian clichés have replaced the elephants and snake charmers. It’s a well made caricature of a country and a caricature can never be a Mona Lisa, for a masterpiece can’t be one dimensional juxtaposition of sadistic extremes… and that’s my grouse with the celebrations…

And I say all this not because I don’t know what is India. I know its poverty and the real statistics around it a little better than most others – especially the Indian film critics who have given “Slumdog…” an average of 4 to 4.5 stars! But the fact is that the film’s entire narration seems like the germination of a terribly sadistic and complex mind with the sole aim of satisfying the western idea of India – and its new found growth instincts at their cost – and it is done through a combination of illogical happenings in order to show everything in a disgustingly negative vein. Not that it doesn’t exist, but it surely doesn’t exist in this fictitious manner. While “Salaam Bombay” had realism, “Slumdog…” is just every scrap of dirt picked up from every corner and piled up together to try and hit back at the growing might of India. And the awards almost seem like a sadistic effort to show the world – look we knew that this was India, and these are the slumdogs we are outsourcing our jobs to. It stinks of racial arrogance and it’s such a shame now on second thought to see the Indian faces – including that of the undoubted master, AR Rahman – celebrating its success. There is nothing positive about the film and it seems that a deranged sadist has painted his insecure negative self in each and every character of the movie. It illogically shows every negative thing about India happening in the protagonist’s life… slums, open-air lavatories, riots, underworld, prostitution, brothels, child labour, begging, blinding and maiming of kids to make them into ‘better beggars’, petty peddlers, traffic jams, irresponsible call centre executives… everything apart from western pedophiles roaming around in Indian streets!! And its winning of so many awards and nominations only goes on to prove strongly that the paradigm of cinema and recognition of films are in the hands of a few retarded imperialistic minds. It’s a crying shame that our media hasn’t seen through this ruse and is touting “Slumdog’s” nominations to claim that India is shining at the Oscars, while in fact it is lauding a film that mocks and ridicules the idea of ‘India’, pigeonholing its identity into the straitjacket of depraved poverty for a global audience.

When the West wanted Indians to embrace them and their companies to come to India and capture the lucrative markets, suddenly we had all the Indian women, some very beautiful and some not necessarily so, winning all the Miss Universe and Miss Worlds. Today, they are in a crisis and India is looking unstoppable despite its slums and poverty, and they are losing their businesses to us. Isn’t it the best time to paint India as the Slumdog Millionaire?? All in all, the film is nothing but an endorsement of an erstwhile imperial mindset of the West and its blinkered vision of India. An English master has made an Indian slumdog. Don’t even waste your time watching this film in the theatres. It sucks and there is nothing great in it as a film too. Amitabh Bachchan was spot on when he said that Bollywood has made far better mainstream films. Take out a DVD of one of his old films instead…

The Oscars have been won – as expected! And it sure was a pleasure to hear Resul Pookutty speak about the power of silence and Om, and give Hollywood a chalk-talk lesson or two about Indian philosophy. It was also a great feeling to see the Indian living legend – A R Rahman – get something he more than deserved (though he has done far better work as well). The Indian film fraternity has some amazing green thumb talent; and some of them surely are at par with the world’s best. Thus, although only these two (Rahman and Resul) got the Oscar, I am sure there are many more deserving Indians out there who are no inferior. The only unfortunate thing is that the Oscars for them were awarded for a film that has been made clearly with one callow intention in mind – to draw up a caricature of every possible negative side that is there to India, for the sole viewing pleasure of western audiences – as I wrote in my editorial on the same issue a few weeks back (to read the same, log on to http://arindamchaudhuri.blogspot.com/2009/01/dont-see-slumdog-millionaire-it-sucks.html). Having said most of all I wanted to say about the film the last time, this time there are two more aspects to the slumdog phenomenon I wish to highlight!

I really don’t want to take away from the happiness of the Indians who won the big awards; and surely they deserve all the accolades. And as I wrote earlier, it sure is a well made film with an interesting narrative style. However, I am quite shocked at the shameful euphoria created by the half educated Indian media that has unanimously termed the movie as an “Indian pride” and “the world taking note of India”. Neither could anything be further from the truth than this nor could anything stink more of a pathetic lack of intellect and understanding of reality. While a considerable number of people are saying that it (Slumdog Millionaire) is just a film and should be simply enjoyed as a creative process and left alone, the fact – as I wrote before – is that it also happens to be a film very evidently made to show ‘only’ everything that is possibly wrong with India (often, in a completely concocted manner) for the pure viewing pleasure of western audiences, because poverty-porn sells in the west. Yes, the movie has been marketed well… as the feel-good film of the year (for the western audiences most certainly)! To me, it surely is the most negative feel-good film I have seen! As a film, it works; but it really is then just a film… It has no commitment, for it delves on no issue and shows poverty in the most depoliticized manner. From the name of the film (Jhoparpatti Ke Kutte Bane Crorepati – if one were to translate the movie’s name into Hindi), to every scene in the film including Anil Kapoor’s completely unreal character, the movie has a clear dilettante attempt to show India in a deliberately abrogating manner. Leading NGOs working in Mumbai slums have vouched that they have never seen maiming of children for begging – in fact ask yourself, how many times have you ever seen a blind child beggar? All those who have read our cover story on the film (http://www.thesundayindian.com/08022009/default.asp) would know how at every stage, the flick has just played with reality to show India in a jaundiced light without any obvious commitment to showing the pains of poverty – apart from Danny Boyle’s surrogate post-film speeches of course! Far from it bringing any glory to India or Indians, Boyle’s caustic photoplay has only satisfied the western urge to look further down upon the ‘repugnant’ India, especially at a time when while they are reeling under depression, India is purposefully growing healthily. The evident western desperation to speciously paint India so vacuously couldn’t have been shallower. Globalization backfired on them and took away their jobs… So it obviously feels great to see this side to India and heartily award it as well!!

The west would have wanted to believe India still is a land of elephants and snake charmers; and therefore, were very uncomfortable thinking that perchance it no more seems to be so and was changing too fast for their comfort. Now they know India has changed indeed!!! It is no more the land of elephants and snake charmers… It is the land of shit-swimming slumdogs, who are turning millionaires… more by goddamned luck than by hard work. That’s their new view of India. That is the power of a well made and well marketed film and that is the new brand image of India that one film has been able to create. And that is why this film cannot be left alone by Indians as just a film. People have to realize its ramifications. Today, when you meet anyone who has seen the film abroad but has not been to India (well, most haven’t), amongst many other similar questions, you are faced with the question – do kids really swim in shitholes as shown in the film?

That, however, brings us to the second very important aspect. While what I wrote above is an undisputable fact, the fact also is that poverty and slums are the ugly reality of India. And yes, while the people living in slums are not dogs, this country unfortunately makes them live worse than the way western people could think of making their dogs live about five decades back! So India, this new image of India – of slumdog millionaires – was waiting to be created. It has been our own doing… or undoing. And as I sat watching this year’s budget in the midst of this new image of India, I was saddened that even this year nothing was done to try and remove these slums from India. What was most shocking is what happened the day after Slumdog Millionaire swept the Oscars. The next day, the big budget sops got announced – a whopping figure of Rs 30,000 crores for the Indian rich in the form of reduction of service taxes etc. it made me really sad to see that while the world has a new outlook for India, the fools in the Indian media failed to rub it into the minds of our people; and our politicians – visionless as ever – remained shamelessly uncommitted in the wake of this newfound status (read shameful status). A 300 square feet two-room flat with a dignified toilet and kitchen costs anything between Rs 65,000 to Rs 1,00,000 to construct in a basic manner. And given the fact that 25% out of the 30 crore people living in cities live in slums, India needs 1.5 crore such flats (assuming that, on an average, these 7.5 crore slum dwelling families have 5 members each) to become free of any slums and to give these people dignity of existence. This, in effect, means that all the government has to do is plan a Rs 1,50,000 crore budget for the same or Rs 30,000 crores per year for five years! Instead of giving away these meaningless and visionless sops, the government would have done well to declare that it would spend Rs 30,000 crores per year in the next five years to remove all slums from India so that there can no more be any new slumdog millionaires made on India. In fact, as an economist, I find the sops such a foolish act in the middle of this slowdown. At this time, we require jobs to be created, investments to be made; and these sops will do neither. A slum relocation programme would have meant investments to job creation to dignity to the people who we keep in slums like dogs.

Till the time we have a more committed, educated media and a political class, we will remain beach bum fools and fatuously gloat in our change of panhandler status… from that of the land of snake charmers and elephants to the land of shit-swimming slumdogs! Jai ho!!!

 

Slumdog Millionaire is a bad film, an actor once said in a public platform. He had his reasons and most of them were not far from the truth. Slumdog Millionaire has won an ensemble of Oscars and it is a thing of pride for Bollywood’s best music director A.R.Rahman , lyricist Gulzaar and sound-mixer Resul Pookutty for having won home the glory.. But let us ask ourselves is Slumdog Millionaire really a good movie from Bollywood standards? If yes, then how come Slumdog Millionaire has flopped or been rejected by Indian audiences? Slumdog Millionaire is just another average wanna-be Bollywood film. We are not talking about the poverty aspect which was highlighted by Amitabh Bachchan. We are talking about the movie content purely, which is notches below the standard of what can be called quality film-making. Slumdog Milionaire has the same lost and found formula done to death by Indian film-makers. Haven’t we seen a street urchin becoming a ganglord, in the 70s Bollywood flicks? What is Slumdog Millionaire trying to say? That it is okay to steal shoes from the Taj Mahal? Is this the message that the movie portrays to young children? Also, how comes Anil Kapoor who plays the quiz master so quietly sneaks in Jamal(Dev) to the police? How come there is no uproar? How come the media is never interested? And why will the police unnecessarily grill the boy, give third degree treatment to a someone who has won public adulation and one crore rupees? Not only is the plot far-fetched, there are also clichés galore: Salim and Jamal are muslims, the other musketeer Lathika HAS to be from the other caste, otherwise the plot will not move ahead. When the two boys are separated from Lathika, she HAS to turn into a prostitute. The director is clearly going the clichéd way which has ever been experimented so many times by our Bollywood film-makers. Where is the creativity? If an Indian film-maker had the same film, I seriously doubt the critics would have given the film four or five stars. Jamal grows up to be a ‘chai-wallah’ in a call center. But he answers questions in the ‘Who wants to be a Millionaire’ in the finest UK accent, akin to an MBA grad from UK? I have yet to see a chaiwallah from a call center who speaks such eloquent English. Let’s look at the performances. Anil Kapoor has clearly over-acted in his wanna-be Clint Eastwood accent. Praises and award nominations are being heaped on the dusky Freida Pinto who played Lathika in Slumdog Millionaire. But is it really an engrossing performance? Far from it. Looking overhead from the platform and giving a model pose does not call for an arresting performance. Her real test will lie when she gets to do performance driven roles. A.R.Rahman has given far better music in his previous albums and one rues the fact that the Oscar fraternity completely ignored him for a much superior score in Lagaan. One can sense that the honor is primarily because of a white connection (read Danny Boyle). Though the plot is not really convincing, the treatment of Slumdog Millionaire and the screenplay is admittedly good enough. But that does not mean Bollywood has been bad in screenplays of late. Movies like Rang De Basanti, Dil Chahta Hai, Ghajini and even Gangster were also better if not equal in terms screenplay treatment. So there is nothing in Slumdog Millionaire to feel ‘wow’ about, at least to the people who have grown up on Bollywood films. Also let’s not forget that Slumdog Millionare is essentially an English film, the artistes and some of the crew is Indians. Dyslexia is a major concern in the US, and the truth is the best movie on dyslexia in the world was made by an Indian- Taare Zameen Par. Isn’t it a shame that we are unnecessarily heaping praises on a mediocre film Slumdog Millionaire when a masterpiece like Taare Zameen Par was ignored by the Oscar jury. Let us be practical and assess the quality of movies with a sense of discern. Something which Indians actually did-Slumdog Millionaire is a flop in India.

It might seem strange at first glance that Bollywood and Hollywood have become such cozy friends. The world’s two greatest film industries have always been independent of each other, with different aesthetics, storylines, actors and audiences.

But after more than a century running parallel to each other, Bollywood and Hollywood are now engaged in a symbiotic dance that has seen Bollywood movies become a Hollywood success, Singh is King top the worldwide box office charts, and Spiderman in all its avatars win the box office in India. Aishwarya Rai does a juicy cameo in Pink Panther:2, Sylvester Stallone and Denise Rich do cameos in Khambakht Ishq, and Snoop Dogg is an enthusiastic item boy for the keynote song in Singh is King. Hollywood is now financing Hindi movies, while Bollywood finances Hollywood flicks.

Cultural Imperialism is dead. Long live cultural free trade.

Still, some things do get lost in translation, so the increasing cooperation between the two film industries has created a demand for people who understand them both intimately.

Vishal Solanki is a gifted, young cinematographer who has experience in both cultures and both industries. Solanki began studying photography initially at the Indo American Society in Mumbai and subsequently succeeded in enrolling at the over 150 years old historic Sir J. J. Inst. Of Applied Art, Mumbai (the most reputed institution for Applied Art in India).

While studying for his BFA, Solanki also spent a lot of time drawing, painting and studying all forms of artistic applications. Solanki graduated Sir J. J. Institute Of Applied Art winning 5 awards, including the State Government Bronze Award for best work, the CAG Bronze and the John Walter Thompson ‘Big Idea of the Year’.

He returned to work as an apprentice to renowned veteran Director of Photography Binod Pradhan on commercials, music videos and one of the most successful movies in Bollywood history, Munnabhai MBBS directed by Rajkumar Hirani. Solanki also assisted cinematographer Vijay Kartik on his famous Bollywood venture Taxi No. 9211, directed by Milan Luthria.

On the other side of the world, Solanki was Director of Photography on Losing You, a feature film directed by Canadian director Ian Clay, which is slated for release in 2009.

Apart from feature films, he has created a stir in the Documentary genre, which is almost non-existent in Bollywood. His work on documentary Pashan Palvi has received immense praise and his work on female infanticide documentary titled ‘Sunaina’ is receiving a great response in film festivals in Europe.

When did you know you were going to be a cinematographer?

It happened over time, so I can’t give you a precise date. I always loved movies, and was particularly drawn to the look of a movie. While I was studying painting at Sir J. J. Inst. Of Applied Art, I took up a course in still photography alongside.

Soon I was assisting my seniors in lighting portraits and helping them out in the dark room printing black and white photos. I then took up photography as my specialization at JJ. I was 18 and during that time, I was looking at movies constantly to get inspiration for lighting. Slowly, I realized that cinematography would offer me avenues to discover both lighting along with emotions with the help of narrative. Devdas had just released and whole of Bollywood was stunned by the visuals created by Binod Pradhan. After that, I had no doubts that I wanted to work and learn under him. I called his residence for around fifteen days non-stop, making friends with all his family, but he was generally out on shoots. Finally one day he picked up the phone and allowed me to meet him on set at Concorde Studios where he was shooting a commercial for Fair and Lovely cream. I would say after that shoot, I had no doubts that cinematography is what I wanted to do.

Was there a formal connection between the institute and Bollywood? Did you know when you got out of college you would work in Bollywood?

Well I won’t say that there was a visibly formal connection, but at the same time people seem to trust students of JJ without any doubt. I was doing still photography when I was 19 and 20 for big clients like Airtel, Planet M and a lot of advertising print media. Also, some alumni of JJ had emerged as successful filmmakers both in ad films and feature films. I just looked up to them and I thought that if they could do it, I could do it as well. I did not look at Bollywood as the only area of concentration since there was a lot of media like tv commercials, music videos and documentaries which in essence is not always Bollywood but I still have a strong liking in creating such media.

So your career began when you were still in school. What did you do then?

 

I am very happy with the way things have gone. I was always the youngest no matter which set I was on. At a certain point, people advised me that I was young and that I had time for formal training. I then planned to leave for my studies in Cinematography and Directing. I received an honors in both from the Los Angeles Film School in Hollywood.

That’s interesting, how do you compare and differentiate between Bollywood and Hollywood? Did you notice a difference between the industries?

 

Yes, definitely. There is a difference in almost everything. Every thought. Every way of doing things. On a larger level Bollywood is a film industry, whose psychology is primarily based on sentiments and beliefs of the Indian culture to a large extent and Hollywood is a more assorted basket as far as these beliefs are concerned. It is a more cosmopolitan mix of screenwriters, directors and other technicians who come along from diverse backgrounds. Also I think Hollywood films have a more universal liking than Bollywood generally because they are made for a wider audience whereas Bollywood aims at Indian audiences in India and rest of the world generally. Language also plays an important role in reaching larger audiences. Technically, there is also a difference in the length, pacing and the structure in which the scripts are written. Also, it is important to not that Indian audiences are very different from rest of the world. Very often it happens that a Hollywood film which does great in the US may not do as good at the box office in India and vice-versa.

Who are your favorite cinematographers and why?

 

I admire the work of cinematographers like Vittorio Storaro, Conrad Hall, Roger Deakins, Christopher Doyle, Dion Beebe, John Toll, Wally Pfister, Gordon Willis, Rodreigo Prieto, Dante Spinotti and Bill Pope. From Indian cinematographers, I am a big fan of Binod Pradhan, Ravi K. Chandran, Santosh Sivan, Ashok Mehta and Anil Mehta. I think they all have great skills in lighting and composition of course, but on a higher level it is how they perceive a script and transform it into compelling storytelling.

What was the most challenging job you’ve had and why?

 

I cannot think of one now. I mean of course there are many challenging things in every project we do, but most of that is planned in pre-production stages. I generally shoot films in many languages. Releve was no dialogue, whereas El Buen Amigo was in Spanish, Pashan Palvi was in Marathi and Losing You in English. India speaks many languages! This is a challenge for any cinematographer because in the end, he has to interpret the script and create his own language on celluloid which is based on lights and shadows; where every audience can connect on an emotional level. Also I have had the opportunity of working with good directors who knew exactly what they wanted so I cannot think of any anecdotes.

What is the future of cinematography, and film itself? The near future? Long term future? What new technology should we look out for?

 

As everyone knows that film is diminishing, as in film stock, digital technology such as Hi Definition and Blu Ray are definitely the near future. The beauty of technology is that you never know the long term future, because technology

 

always takes us by surprise! One thing is for sure, media will get more easy to access, through the internet via cell phones, laptops etc. making viewing an easier experience.

And what is the future of Bollywood-Hollywood cooperation and co-production?

 

It will be a great fusion of different sensibilities and techniques, coming together to tell a universal story with emotions for a worldwide audience. Both India and the US are vast countries, with cosmopolitan cities and people from all around the world and different cultures. India within Indians itself, is so diverse with so many languages, dialects and cultural behavior. This is just the beginning and I am sure it is one of a breathtaking journey!