Slumdog Millionaire

First things first. Feelgood Film Of The Decade, the poster and advance
publicity claims. Yeah, no. Mamma Mia is the feelgood film of the decade.
Slumdog Millionaire, by contrast, does not have any weddings on Greek islands,
constant bursting into song, etc. It has a young man being tortured and
interrogated by the police, after being accused of cheating in Who Wants To Be
A Millionaire, with the sole evidence of this being that he's a slumdog, a kid
from the shanty towns, and what could he possibly know? The movie then tells
the story of his unremittingly unpleasant life, showing us how some awful
moments in his life told him the answer to the various questions, as he
attempts to explain himself.

Ultimately, the message of this film is that many of the children of India live
in filth and squalor, experiencing violence and deprivation every day of their
lives, have to resort to various forms of criminality to survive, and even if
they were to have the amazing fortune to be given an opportunity to get out
(like Millionaire) the majority will lack the education to make use of those
opportunities. The feelgood factor of the lad's unlikely success in the quiz is
tempered by the very implausibility that the few things he knows came up. And
that even as he does well, he faces the scepticism and brutality of the police
as his reward. That and, even if he won a million, if he split it between all
the people in India who also desperately need it, they'd have less than a
quid each.

This is a blisteringly good film, in that it doesn't shy away from showing the
appalling conditions they live in, while never letting that become a sermon
that takes away from the story. Feelgood film? No, it's much, much better than
that.