Oscars: No comment (almost)

I'd recently been feeling like I'm "supposed" to see "Slumdog Millionaire" due to its Oscar chances, but had vague trepidations thus far. Thankfully, it sounds like this post nails exactly why, and saved me the presumably wasted two hours: it's the kind of word-of-mouth hit where "word of mouth" means all the grandmas like it, and I'll probably hate it. Somehow those always sneak up on me until I'm trapped in the theater, but thankfully not this time....

Finally a movie we agree on.

I'm with you Jim. I'm so tired of hearing about Slumdog and how it's become the year's must-see movie. I love watching the Oscars, but for the first time in a while, I'm really not looking forward to the broadcast. Also, the Springsteen snub was ridiculous. I will be pulling for Rourke, which is one of the few things that'll pull me into watching.

I agree. Movies are not allowed to manipulate. One must have contempt for stylistic polish. A more objective camera is preferred for filming scenes of brutality and torture... what you want is an almost documentary style of filming. Or, better yet, forget fiction altogether. Nothing beats the real thing. So, for that matter, forget movies.

You know, I have such a different opinion on this. While I hear what you're saying... you're hinting that they are exploiting the violence to make a pretty entertainment movie. But what was the alternative? Should Boyle have pulled a Kubrick a la "Clockwork Orange", sit back and pick his nose while a character is abused on-screen? I'm not sure what that would have accomplished in this situation...

But I hear what you're saying about the structure. It might have been more amazing to show his life first... then get to the gameshow at the end and suddenly all these things we've been seeing provide the answers. But I was won over anyway by the sheer fun of imagining 'what if he did have all the answers' and then seeing how it could, hypothetically, be possible.

JE: Sorry. I don't have any desire to defend straw man arguments I didn't make.

I may get a lot of flack for this but here goes:
Which of your above comments wouldn't also apply to Schindler's List?
Except maybe instead of "slick" and "shiny" substitute "artistic black and white" and "beautiful interplay of light and shadow". Is there a more beautifully lit and composed shot in the Spielberg film than the one of the child who has jumped down into sewage- a shot which also happens to appear in the Boyle film? I'm not defending or condemning either film, just saying that they are not so different. Even the endings are two different sides of the same coin.

JE: Yes, indeed. Some have made legitimate arguments along those lines.

Plus it's up against: mediocre biopic, mediocre stage/real life adaptation, Gump part 2 (with an added bonus of Katrina-related offensiveness), and sub-par Holocaust drama. Hoorah!

Now I will say this in its defense: Slumdog is better than Crash in at least one significant area, in that it doesn't pretend to be about more than it is. There's no pretension in Boyle outside of pyrotechnics, and I found Slumdog to be an enjoyable diversion, even if ultimately insubstantial. The emptiness of the Gumpish main character bothered me, too.

But Boyle's visual style doesn't bother me, in part because he uses the Dutch angles effectively (there are some nice sequences where a particular angle from a titled shot is echoed by the angle of objects in the next frame, which itself isn't tilted). Is there a point to it outside of style? Not really, but I think he's got enough skill to pull it off: he has an excellent eye.

It's not something I'd defend as the Best Picture of the Year (or anywhere on the list), and I definitely won't go out of my way to change your opinion on the film overall. But I enjoyed it, with some reservations, as pure popcorn entertainment.

I guess this means I won't be able to convince you to give Millions a chance after all? If Boyle has a masterpiece under his belt, that's the one: richer characters and a compelling story go a long way.

btw: Karlos, lots of very good movies manipulate. That's not an iron-clad rule by any means.

I'm exhausted from defending the Dark Knight across half a dozen posts, so I'm not really up for this one right now. I'll just say, hey, I loved the movie, but I love most of Boyle's movies, so there you go.

Dark Knight Fans: Hooray, he's finally picking on someone else!

I haven't yet seen "Slumdog Millionaire". I just wanted to stick up for Boyle (well, kind of). I think that "Trainspotting" is one of the most overrated, hard-to-watch films of the 90s, and "The Beach" was similarly over-directed and thoughtless from frame one.

But I caught his film "Millions" and have to say it was one of my favourite films of 2005, much to my surprise. Boyle does his usual whip-pan thing, but the style fits a little more in this case, and the film's spirit of generosity makes a weird kind-of family film classic. I'd encourage you to check it out, if only because a fellow Boyle-basher (myself) ended up enjoying it.

That's the only reason I'm still going to see "Slumdog"...if I consider it at all like "Millions", then I'll probably enjoy it. But I am worried by what I've heard about its glossification of poverty, etc.

Right on, Jim. You've described my own reaction to the film precisely--or at least to the small amount of it that I could force myself to watch.

I love Stuart Klawans' pithy putdown in The Nation, worth quoting in its entirety:

"Who wants to be Satyajit Ray? the subject may be poverty and social change, but the name of the game is fun, and its clues are child beggars, Bollywood, call centers and Taj Mahal--everything the average Westerner might know about India, short of Ben Kingsley in a loincloth."

I think it's possible to see Danny Boyle films as sort of music videos. Except maybe the Kubrick one which was still way more DiPalma than Kubrick. Which reminds me of the reverse case: I always saw David Fincher's music videos more as mini Stanley Kubrick movies. He really had the signature Kubrick camera moves and lighting down back then. I think you could still see the aesthetic from Fincher's music videos in his first two films.

Now I actually liked Slumdog Millionaire. I thought the direction was perfectly fine. It was good but certainly not Oscar worthy. Now a film that I thought was even more undeserved was The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. The writing was atrocious and a poor carbon copy of Forest Gump. The film took an intriguing premise played it safe with every route. Brad Pitt gives a lifeless performance and there is no real character development apart from physical. And it goes on and on for a butt numbing three hours. I just cant believe that the film hasn’t been considered the disaster that it is.

Finally! Jim - in one succinct paragraph you've summed up exactly what I've been trying to tell my friends I hated about Slumdog. It was just far too blatantly manipulative.

And Alex, Millions is my favorite Christmas movie. There I thought the style added to the whimsy of the story.

At least this is one we folks at Slant can't be ragged on for (we being "those people who don't like watching movies").

Your argument is sound, persuasive, and makes me feel your experience - i.e., it's everything a good take does. Without having gone into much depth on it (something, I think, that is indicative of the generally lightweight nature of the film; like it quite a bit though I may, there isn't much thought to it, however you look at it) I think the reason it doesn't irk me is that it doesn't purport any kind of importance beyond the immediacy of it all. It's flash and feeling and it's proud to be such, and nothing in the film made me feel it was trying anything more. I don't love it, per se, but I find it endlessly lovable; I couldn't in a million years put it within even a hundred yards of the stinkpile that is Life if Beautiful.

You forgot one other thing, though: Speed Racer is one of the BEST directed films of the year. ;)

Jim Emerson, Alex Murillo et al.: but, but, the movie doesn't glossify poverty. Are people saying this just because it's shot with high color saturation? I mean, just think of *SPOILERS* the horrific riot in the beginning, or the blinding scene at the orphanage, Latika's rape at the hands of Salim, etc. Yeah, the two main characters make it through the whole ordeal with all their limbs still attached, and they're reunited in the end, but darnit, the journey there is absolutely brutal.

I absolutely agree, Jim.

If you want to read more of my disdain for SLUMDOG, check out my review: http://out1.blogspot.com/2008/12/one-question-for-all-mumbai-marbles.html

I've gotten a lot of flack for ripping this movie. Good to know that I can count on you to be at least one critic who always makes perfect sense.

Boy you sure are a waste of good life, aren't you, Jim?

Just yesterday, I got upbraided for daring to criticize Slumdog Millionaire because it proved I was a snob who simply didn't like the movies that everyone else likes, including the critics. And it's true that the Tomato Meter chimes in at 94% on this movie and it won the audience award in Toronto, but it's the damndest thing - NOBODY I know likes this movie. Not fellow critics I know. Not the other people in a film discussion group I go to who generally like these "Oscar-y" kind of movies. Nobody. Not one.

Slumdog is one of those movies, and there are 1 or 2 of these a year, where I just sit back and wonder "How in the hell could this be anybody's idea of a great movie?" Now, don't get me wrong. I can see how people would enjoy it, particularly those who do not, as you and I see it, feel offended at the glossy tourist-y treatment of its subjects.

Setting aside the fact that the editing in this film is so atrocious it simply has to win an Academy award, I'm deeply bothered by the very structure of the story. And I'm not just talking about the framing device that uses each question to introduce the next sequence, though I did dislike that.

For me, the problem is that the core of the story tells us that if you're suffering, it's OK. Simply endure it all gracefully and then one day, like magic, through not a single accomplishment of your own, everything will turn out perfectly for you. It's hard not to see a Mother Theresa-esque Christian theme here. Suffering is God's gift to man. Accept his plan for you, accept him and nothing else you do matters - you will be saved. And since you will be saved, what's the big deal about the suffering? Chill, dude, it's all good.

You could argue quite reasonably that "Cinderella" has the same structure, and that's as archetypal a story as we have. She's abused by her cruel stepsisters, endures all her misery with the grace of a saint and one day a fairy godmother shows up and it all works out. It's a lovely story but what works with fairy godmothers and pumpkin coaches and princes does not necessarily work as well in the slums of Mumbai.

Let me be fair and note that in the Sight & Sound Poll, 2 of 50 critics put Slumdog on their lists. One of whom is a UK/India based critic (I will dig up the name later - sorry I don't have the magazine now) who wrote glowingly that "Boyle captures the energy of Mumbai like no other director has." I assume this is a writer who is very familiar with Mumbai who did not find it offensive at all. Should I consider this as counter-evidence to my position? Maybe. But I know I'm not the only person who's had this reaction to the film.

I don't consider it as bad as previous Oscar winners Crash or American Beauty, and I wouldn't quite call it one of the worst films of the year. I have to go with the Kate Winslet double dip and Chapter 27 for that honor. But, yeah, I hated Slumdog.

So, the film has a very fast pace, and there are a lot of weird angles and overall sort of an expressionistic style.

... this is bad? I mean, it's one thing if he's trying to achieve that effect and fails, but the film pretty much does what it sets out to do. I had a couple of minor story issues, but the tone wasn't bad. Much better than SUNSHINE which was wrapped up in its own self-importance.

I loved it. Anything that makes me feel this good and makes me embrace life like this gets a thumbs-up from me. Dunno what's so bad about it.

I think the Milan Kundera quote about kitsch sums films like Crash and Slumdog Millionaire. -

“Kitsch causes two tears to flow in quick succession. The first tear says: How nice to see children running on the grass! The second tear says: How nice to be moved, together with all mankind, by children running on the grass! It is the second tear that makes kitsch kitsch."

Glad to see I'm not the only person who thinks "Slumdog" is ridiculously overrated and not deserving of its Oscar noms. Rock on, Jim.

"Danny Boyle has long been on my "Life is Too Short for..." list."

Have you seen Sunshine? The first 70% of that film is the best space sci-fi I've seen in a long while.

There you go again, Jim, nitpicking about technical things that most audience members won't even notice, like angles and editing. You seem to have completely missed the fact that the performances are god-awful, the story is stupid, and a normal plot progression of cause=effect is virtually non-existent.

Remember that scene where Hero was in the office and everything was set up for him to apply for the show and he just... didn't? Or the scene where his brother fills the tub with money as a grand symbolic gesture?

I hate Hate HATED this movie. I'm so happy to have found people with whom I can point at it and laugh derisively. Thank you.

Why was "Waltz with Bashir" nominated for Best Foreign Film? Isn't it AN ANIMATED FILM? Are Academy rules changing?

"For me, the problem is that the core of the story tells us that if you're suffering, it's OK. Simply endure it all gracefully and then one day, like magic, through not a single accomplishment of your own, everything will turn out perfectly for you."

So, uh, being very smart and knowing things is not an accomplishment? Being willing to run and dive into pools of excrement and fast-talk tourists and search for people are not accomplishments?

Sure, there's the destiny element. But that Jamal seems to have a destiny does not mean he's an entirely passive figure.

Different Josh here (I should really use a different name)...

I liked Slumdog Millionaire a lot. I won't deny it has some problems, but at least it seems to come to them legitimately (emotional simplicity and the weight of coincidence are standard Bollywood themes), rather than as the result of bad film-making.

Although I don't think that's a very good excuse; the same idea applies to Pineapple Express, after all (it's not a bug, it's a feature!). The difference is simply that here, it worked for me, and there, it did not.

Why did I like Slumdog? Mostly because of it's energy. Not just in terms of a fast pace, but because of its commitment to well-thought-out, interesting shots at every point in the film. And even though the emotions may seem simple (love, betrayal, pain, hope), I think it is saying some very complicated things about the nature of memory and the construction of a personal and national identity.

My own "almost no comment" on the Oscars: that's great, Academy, but what did you think of the movies that came out before December?

I've just been pissed off by the title from the very beginning. What did I write about it? "It might be a great movie, like people are saying it is, but what an ugly title! That just turns me off right there. It's possibly worse than 'Million Dollar Baby.' You can't put 'baby' in the title of a serious film that way, because the word practically has a dancing beat. Say it. Baby. Baby. Bah-bah. Dance to it. Terrible title for a serious film about boxing! But back to Slumdog Millionaire. Don't you hate the way those words go together? Another title you can almost dance to, and I wanna punch it in the face. 'Slumdog' by itself is a terrible word to put in a movie title, unless it's a comedy. Slumdog. Makes me think of slugs, and of Snoop-dog. But the word itself is just slimy. Green and slimy. And then you put it next to the word millionaire, with its classy syllables, and the two words have a battle to the death. I hate it!"

If an innocent and harmless movie like this instigates hatred in you, you've got some real issues than this movie.

Probably, most of you watched it after it became popular as a result, it is not your little secret movie. Perhaps that's why you didn't like it. I found it entertaining, the music enhanced it and made it refreshingly different (Cellos in movies put me to sleep). the acting was average however, better than Brad Pitt in Benjamin button. It is a good entertaining movie without a message. Just forget the awards hoopla and enjoy it on its merit.

"Except... really, was there a worse-directed movie than 'Slumdog Millionaire' this year?"

Why, yes there was. It's called The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and it's David Fincher's worst film since Alien 3. You should check it out...or better yet, don't.

As it happened, the only two of the five best nominees I've seen were "The Reader," and "Slumdog Millionaire." My first response to "Slumdog" was that it was competent. It was enjoyable in its own way. It was better than "Chicago," not as good as "The Departed," in the category of occasional enjoyable Great Picture nominees that are not truly great. Actually I spent much of the year trying to watch classic films that I've never seen yet, so my top 10 movies would be "The Flowers of Saint Francis," "Smiles of a Summer Night," "There Will Be Blood," "The Miracle of Morgan's Creek," "One, Two, Three," "Persepolis," "Vidas Secas," "Le Trou," "Satantango," and Lubitsch's "Angel" with special runner-ups for "Summer," "Army of Shadows," "The Red and the White," "Long Day's Journey into Night," and "Through the Olive Trees."

I will say that "Slumdog Millionaire" is a much better movie than "The Reader," which appears as little more than a device to get Kate Winslett an oscar. I remember seeing one of the hosts of "At the Movies" (I think it was Mankewicz) who praised Winslett's skill for getting sympathy for someone who is both a Nazi and a "sexual predator." For the last part, oh please. The whole bloody selling point of the movie is to see her without any clothes on. If Daldrey had switched the sexes and had the Winslett/Fiennes characters played by Jack Black and Miley Cyrus, they probably wouldn't be very convincing Germans, and the triviality of Winslett's character's problems would still be apparent, but it would have shown some weird integrity. The whole movie reminds of the South Park episode where the chief cop is taught to read by the town librarian through a complex game involving molesting chickens. At the end the cop gets "Atlas Shrugged" as a gift, which ends up destroying any interest in reading.

In another year your reservations might have some weight. But three of the nominees are increasingly seen as middlebrow white elephants who only got nominated because "Revolutionary Road" and "Doubt" were even less deserving. "Milk" got enough votes to get on the Village Voice top 10, but it suffers from the impression that it's less courageous, politically and cinematically, than "Brokeback Mountain." Given that "Slumdog Millionaire" is not as jaw-droppingly inept as "Crash" and more interesting, indeed fun, than "Gladiator" or "A Beautiful Mind," I doubt your indignation will matter much. Yes, it euphemizes poverty, but how many Hollywood pictures (or Bollywood pictures) tell the truth? I know you liked "No Country for Old Men," but I thought its portrait of inexorable evil was rigged, by both McCarthy and the Coens, and it is arguably far more corrupt than anything Boyle does.

"Casting is skin-deep: The good characters are pretty, the mean ones are distinguished by cosmetic irregularities, the slimy ones are... slimy-looking."

Not sure I agree there, Jim. Jamal is the hero -- he is far from pretty. Skinny, kinda geeky. The chubby security guard is, I suppose, one of those "mean" characters you refer to. But even he expresses something of a conscience in questioning whether Jamal REALLY did cheat. Irfan Khan is another "mean" character, I suppose. I thought that even he had kindness in his eyes, and eventually gave Jamal the benefit of the doubt. Where does Salim, Jamal's brother, fit into your characterisations of the characters being either "mean", "pretty", or "slimy"? He isn't distinguished by any cosmetic irregularities -- in fact, he's quite a good-looking kid. Is he not, to some extent, FORCED into a life of "mean"-ness?

As for the sliminess, Anil Kapoor as the game show host, I thought, was exceedingly convincing. He could have been either the most charming man in the room, or the slimiest (it turns out that, spoiler, he is the slimiest). The gangster that Latika (who is pretty, I will give you that) is taken in by is slimy, but I don't think that negates the fact that there are men like him in India (my family lived in India for many years, we all think that Slumdog Millionaire fairly and accurately represents the myriad of contradictions that India is today). Same goes for the orphanage head.

I'm not really surprised that you didn't like Slumdog Millionaire given the divergence in our tastes, Jim! But I think you've certainly made better arguments against other films than your brief review of Slumdog Millionaire above. I look forward to a longer essay on it soon, if you write one. I personally loved the movie to death (in case you didn't notice).

There's a contradiction in your argument Jim: you complain that the good characters are pretty and the bad ones are unattractive (btw, it's not that such casting is anything exceptional, I could name hundreds of films, good ones and bad ones, that use this as a tool), yet you also complain that the suffering and violence is presented in an overly slick way. The latter point is debatable (how do you explain all the complaints from India regarding the film if it doesn't hit home?), but if we go along with it, the solution would be to differentiate the scenes depicting suffering and violence aesthetically from the scenes that do not, which would be a strategy quite similar in its obviousness to the casting decisions you criticize.

Christopher Long says: You could argue quite reasonably that "Cinderella" has the same structure, and that's as archetypal a story as we have. She's abused by her cruel stepsisters, endures all her misery with the grace of a saint and one day a fairy godmother shows up and it all works out. It's a lovely story but what works with fairy godmothers and pumpkin coaches and princes does not necessarily work as well in the slums of Mumbai.

Not to say that Slumdog's plot is any more plausible than Cinderella, but there's a big difference in the subtext. Cinderella never really does much for anyone; she obediently endures her lot and in the end is ultimately saved by her beauty and rewarded with wealth. The message, as far as I can tell, is to be a good little girl and don't get fat or ugly, and maybe someday your prince will come. Slumdog, on the other hand, was quite obviously a standard-issue Dickens plot, lots of Great Expectations with a dash of Oliver Twist. Jamal's character survives through a combination of luck, resourcefulness, and complete guilelessness, and in the end he's rewarded for keeping his innocence. Of course it's fairytale stuff, but what else would you want from a film that opens with a game show and ends with a musical number?

Jim, I don't think you were wrong about the way all the visual choices eliminated any possibility of emotional ambiguity and repacked the suffering as entertainment. In my opinion, this is a huge problem for films that purport to be based on fact - i.e. Schindler's List, or just about any Oscar-y biopic - but a perfectly logical approach for a film that clearly wants to be Dickens and Bollywood and Frank Capra and M.I.A. video all at once. Somehow I doubt there would be any backlash here if it were released in the summer, when it was widely assumed that Hollywood would wind up releasing better "prestige" films later on (it didn't).

As for the Oscar thing, I don't think SM was the best film of the year (I'd have chosen Waltz With Bashir, which coincidentally is also beautiful and entertaining even in scenes of immense horror and suffering). But if the Oscars are "about" anything, it's the Industry showing us what standards it wants to be judged by. Even if it has to give a nod to some outsiders every now and then, and the end of the day it needs us to revere the flashy, romantic heavy-handed crowd pleasers and historical biopics and shouting matches that it knows how to sell, lest we start demanding more quiet or subtle or offbeat films than it's even capable of making. Too bad, though, that these films are hogging valuable space at art houses when they clearly belong in the multiplex.

Re: Sam...

"I loved it. Anything that makes me feel this good and makes me embrace life like this gets a thumbs-up from me. Dunno what's so bad about it."

Yes, but did you feel good on your own, or were you tricked into it by the movie?

JE: I know this was addressd to Sam, but personally, I wouldn't used the word "tricked." To me it felt more like the movie was Jack Bauer using coercive interrogation techniques -- on me. That I did not enjoy.

Alright, let me try this again.

"I regretted my decision from the opening sequence, which intercuts an interrogation on "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" with the eye-candy torture (beating, high-voltage toe-shocking) of a kid who's tied up and suspended from the ceiling -- all with thudding music (just like the TV game show!) and Dutch angles galore. (The television show is black and blue; the torture chamber is orange and red -- all glossy as can be.)"

To me that all equates to: don't use a flashy visual style to film a torture sequence because you are exploiting true suffering for entertainment/ it isn't true to the experience.

No, it isn't true. It's an artistic interpretation using colors. What other options are there? I suggested maybe something more objective like "A Clockwork Orange" filming the rape scenes. But, applied to "Slumdog", that would seem to be from the torturer's emotional POV. Instead, Boyle makes the film a hellish red and cuts to the cold, cruel blue of the gameshow. Maybe that's too knee-jerk for you.

How would you have filmed it? (Not would you have, how would you?)

I suggested a style closer to documentary style as another alternative. Still too objective for my liking. Maybe less manipulative, maybe less realistic... but, hey, these are movies we're talking about. You can't make them the real thing. I get more out of the colors Boyle uses.

But I'll keep reading...

"Like its title, "Slumdog Millionaire" is so picturesquely "gritty" it's oleaginous."

Again, would a less pristine and picturesque, documentary-like approach appeal to you more?

"Even the cruelty is pristine. Casting is skin-deep: The good characters are pretty, the mean ones are distinguished by cosmetic irregularities, the slimy ones are... slimy-looking."

I didn't comment on this because I think you have a point. On the other hand, casting based on looks... I mean, we're gonna have to call back a bunch of supposed classics if we can't ever do this. But you make a good point about something to think about going forward...

"Not since "Crash" -- or possibly "Mississippi Burning" -- has a movie packaged brutality in slicker, shinier, tighter shrink-wrap. It's asphyxiating."

Or... exhilarating?

"You will never have to worry about what you are supposed to feel and when you are supposed to feel it because the movie will always feed you the answers, then smack you when it's your cue to emote. You can "surrender" completely to the experience (it demands nothing less), and you needn't worry that you will be given an idle moment in which you will be left to feel, or breathe, on your own. This is the kind of mechanical spectacle people like to call an "audience picture," but that's simply because it doesn't allow any space for non-autonomic responses."

So here's how I get to my rants on manipulation. Though, in all fairness, maybe I should have added... manipulation is fine if if a film can do it well. And I think "Slumdog" does it well because, well, how else would you film those scenes? I'm not saying there are no other ways, just that... that to me that the colors Boyle uses scream out the intensity of the moment the character is experiencing. To lessen that would be to lessen the affect. Though, maybe it would allow for audience interpretation... but what is there really to interpret from a torture scene? Again, to dampen that affect would be to see the event from the torturer's POV... at least that's how it would feel to me.

I don't feel crushed by the style of the film. I'd feel crushed by a lack of style. Instead the film is so full of energy that each moment feels so vividly alive. And that's what movies are to me. They are manipulating me to be in the moment.

Look, I like having my own feelings and interpretations as much as anybody else. But then I also recognize that if the film can create a wowing atmosphere, that is worth just as much.

Otherwise I wouldn't care at all for "Singin' in the Rain" cause I'm not sure how people's thoughts and feelings will range on that. Not a lot of room for interpretation there.

"Don't even get me started on the schematic, dramatically flat structure (game show question followed by flashback to how how the contestant learned the answer)..."

And I gave you credit for this.

But I know what you're reacting to.

I took some of your arguments down the slippery slope they're perched at the top of, stretched them to an extreme. That's not fair. I'm sorry. Won't do it again, even it feels to me like you're just a hop and a skip away from some of those arguments, it's not the same thing as actually having those points of view... so I apologize. I know you demand preciseness.

JE: Thank you, Karlos. Yes, both this and the recent "Dark Knight" posts are attempts at talking specifically about something almost ineffable: style. "Slumdog," "Clockwork Orange" and, say, a documentary like "Man on Wire" (or "No End in Sight") are all stylistic (and, you might say, extremely stylized) achievements. I'd never say that only one "type" of style (or individual directorial style) is appropriate for shooting a movie about a particular subject or place. Sometimes unexpected stylistic combinations (like the hard-edged urban daylight opening of "The Dark Knight") can be exciting and revealing. I can't abide Danny Boyle's style in this movie, and that's what I was describing.

Look, you HAVE to start a regular series where you and Roger Ebert argue movies, blog-style. You guys just fundamentally disagree on too many films. Your first installment can be "Slumdog Millionaire," since it's topical, but I really want to read your fight over "Apocalypse Now." Yes, I'm a geek.

I wish the whole film would have taken place in the flashbacks' timeframe. That had some charm at least. But I think your review and Brandon Colvin's above have helped hone in on a lot of what's wrong with this movie.

As I state in my review the game show framing device is so facile it adds a measure of predictability to the film.

And the contrivances? Like Brandon says in his review, why would the brother give the girlfriend his cell at the end of the film, and why would it ring incessantly, giving her time to return to the car in time to get the call? My cell goes to voicemail after 5 rings.

Your commentary has switched from a qualified film critic, to one found simply on a myspace blog entry.

Boyle is a fantastic director. I'm sorry that your prejudices have caused you to avoid him. 28 Days Later is incredibly filmed, especially when you understand the conditions he was working with. Sunshine was another high quality film, even if you don't like the ending. And The Beach? Its another wonderful film. One of the more underrated films of my generation. Its one of those films that people avoided because it had Leo in it (during the days when he was marketed based on his face, and not on his acting ability), and then once they sit down and watch it they are blown away.

He is an art minded director. I understand that you don't like the 'in-your-face' attributes of the film. But some movies might need that, don't you think? I think these same attributes existed in City of God.

While I think I like Boyle more than you, Jim, I also pretty much hated SLUMDOG.

You are right about the structure. Did it even need the whole torture angle? Why not have it just be the guy on the show, and then flashing back, eliminate the overdone beatings and such? That completely took me out of the film.

And how is this film a feel good audience story that the ads are proclaiming? I found it to be one of the most disturbing and depressing films in quite a while.

I mean, the whole swimming in the outhouse scene played for laughs? Other than the fact that Boyle was ripping off his own TRAINSPOTTING, I just found that sequence grotesque (as well as worrying about all the diseases the character probably contracted).

And you are right, it is the new CRASH.

This strikes me as one of those years in which Hollywood decided to congratulate itself on its progressive worldview. Movies like Milk, Frost/Nixon, Slumdog, Benjamin Button, and The Reader are all being displayed to show how wonderful and progressive Hollywood is. How they're fighting for gay rights, open press, Katrina victims and against homophopbia, evil conservatives, and Nazis.

We saw it in 2006, when Crash, Brokeback, Munich, Good Night & Good Luck, and Capote were nominated, in what I just assumed would always be the worst lineup in Oscar history.

The Oscars are rapidly losing relevance because they are ignoring quality for themes. None of the five movies nominated this year are great movies. I agree with your problems with Slumdog, but that doesn't change the fact that it's still the best of the five nominees! None of these five movies will be more than a trivia question in ten years. No one will remember them, and no one really wants to watch them twice.

What movies will be remembered as the five best of 2008? The Wrestler, Dark Knight, Let The Right One In, Synechoche, and Wall-E. In other words, not the five nominees.

I thought Dark Knight was the worst directed film of the year.
Dutch angles are used to give a feeling of disorientation. I would call the colors garish, not pleasing to the eye as eye candy is meant to be.
If Danny Boyle was slumming that would imply either he is better than the material or he is wallowing in filth, yet the film mostly takes place in ghettos, which are filthy. Was this pleasing fodder eye candy or an acceptance of the place within the structure of a fairy tale?
In keeping with the idea of a fairy tale, the ugly characters are ugly, the good ones fair and pleasing to the eye. Dickens did this with names, why not with faces? Especially in a fairy tale.
The structure is likewise simple and straightforward. There is little to be curious about in Sleeping Beauty but it can speak to an idea of love as comatose, alive but out of reach. The structure serves as an indication of the type of story it is. Is this too neat and clean? Yes. There is nothing to be ambiguous about. Its a celebration to me and has that feeling. Do you like attending drab parties where people eye each other suspiciously and wonder at their true motives for being there? Is it Mr. Boyle's responsibility to provide a lesson on the socio-economic conditions in India's poor population? It may very well be an audience picture. Hitchcock made audience pictures. I would argue it is not a lack in Mr. Boyle's abilities nor does he have ulterior motives to unduly manipulate the audience. I would not pledge my undying loyalty to this film and may only see it again a few more times but when they danced I danced, I felt the rhythm and it felt good.

I haven't seen Slumdog Millionaire, nor any of the best-picture noms for that matter, so I can't comment on the movie itself. But I do have a question. How is it that you can be Roger Ebert's web editor and a film critic yourself, and yet you and Roger seem to have a 180degree relative taste in movies. I wouldn't require that you and he agree on everything or to the same degree, to be his web-editor, but I would think you might like some of the same movies, occasionally. Several of the big examples this year seem to be The Dark Knight and Slumdog, but Fight Club is a good example as well and numerous others that I can't think of off the top of my head. I mean, it would seem that your difference in taste of movies would escalate beyond a respectful disagreement, I would think you guys have some pretty heated arguments, and not in a good way, based on your differing tastes alone. Anyway, I hope you guys don't end up in too many fights.

Agreed on Slumdog, agreed on Boyle in general... but you really should see Sunshine.

Jim,

I don't know if Karlos was making straw-man arguments as much as he was following your reasoning to its ultimate, logical-but-absurd conclusion.

After all, when people say they don't like it when movies are "manipulative," I think they're really saying, "This particular movie has not manipulated me successfully."

Which is a fair criticism, of course.

Just sayin'.

Hansen,

The Best Foreign Language Film category has no stipulation against animated features, and it never did. All that a movie needs to be eligible for consideration is that it must be submitted by its country of origin (each country only gets to make one submission), and the majority of the dialogue must be in a non-English language that is one of the official languages of the country of origin. Waltz with Bashir was eligible for both Best Foreign Language Film and Best Animated Feature, and most prognosticators were actually expecting it to be nominated in BOTH categories.

@ Hansen Reck: Animated films can be nominated in non-animated categories, but dammit if any of their choices make sense this year. Idiots had the opportunity to grant The Dark Knight and WALL-E high honors, thus bridging the gap between the public and the Hollywood insiders. Instead, they pulled a George Bush and shot themselves in the foot, twice.

Granted, I only think WALL-E was actually deserving of the nom, but The Dark Knight's presence (which, in my opinion, wouldn't have been an atrocity by any means) would have given them such points across the board that haven't been seen since... Star Wars? They want better ratings? They deserve whatever they get at this point.

And just to be clear to the world, my statements about Speed Racer are entirely irony-free.

Let me add:

I'm not sure what's wrong with a movie that forces an emotional response on the audience. My only problem is when a movie does so in a way that seems untrue to the established reality of the film. Slumdog Millionaire never seemed, to me, like anything but itself. It established its rules--stylized, hyper-reality packed with awful suffering, rapturous joy and very little inbetween--and kept to them. The whole movie felt exceptionally alive and organic, desperately snatching moments of joy out of horrifying situations, much like the lead character raising a signed photograph to the sky while still covered in crap. You may say it made suffering shiny and glossy, but I felt like it showed how sometimes "suffering" is just "your life." That doesn't make it okay, but I like when a film shows that suffering isn't the same thing as sadness.

Jim,

Man, you are really angry these days. Between this and the "Dark Knight," you've got like six blog entries now where you're right on the line between criticism and regular ol' Internet trolling. At least with "Dark Knight," it was easy to imagine you were reacting to hundreds of fan boy e-mails. But this tone seems to be seeping into everything. Maybe you ought to take a step back and write a column about what the Oscars got right, or something else you can feel positive about. Because it's kinda unpleasant around here....

JE: Sorry. Sometimes I need to vent, in an (over-?)analytical way. But what about my love for "Pineapple Express"?

When I was watching (and thoroughly enjoying) Slumdog Millionaire last month, I had the thought in the back of my head, "Man, a lot of people are going to be railing against this come Oscar time." It's just too easy a film to pick apart. But I don't think it entirely deserves it. It does make some big mistakes. The torture is probably the worst of those. Wouldn't jail be enough? Or maybe people at the show would torture him, but the police? What do they care if he's cheating?

The film has been well defended by its apologists above. It reminds me a lot of past films that have received similar criticisms, notably Vittorio de Sica's Miracle in Milan and Akira Kurosawa's Dodeskaden (the latter to be released by Criterion in March). All three of these films could be referred to as poverty porn, but I think they have a deep sympathy for the poor, and at the very least bring the audience's attention to their plight. If the film causes even five people to give charitably to the poor, which I assume it would, then its effect is clearly positive. Hell, I read that Danny Boyle (or maybe the producers of the film) has set up the three main child actors with assistance for their entire educational careers. I don't think that can count as exploitation.

JE: I'm writing specifically about the movie's style. There's even an execution that's shot through a print-fabric filter. Self-consciously arty? Sure. But it struck me as just tacky. Some have enjoyed the movie as a kind of gaudy fairy tale. To me, it was more like "Pretty Woman" (another Cinderella story I didn't buy) in the slums of Mumbai.

Jim, I knew there was no chance you were going to like this movie because you waited too long to see it. Your skepticism tends to prevail in these cases--your critic hat eats your movie watcher hat. I'm not suggesting you wouldn't have come to the same conclusions anyway, but when a movie is hyped over several months, how can you possibly enjoy yourself unless it's a masterpiece? And City of God, it is not.

Hey, I liked the movie. I understand some of your points, but disagree. I can't really explain why I disagree other than by stating that I see the glass as half-full.

Now please don't give David Fincher a pass for Benjamin Button. Talk about automatic responses..(sleep, indifference, boredom)

My wife and two daughters (ages 22 and 18) all loved Slumdog Millionaire. I enjoyed it quite a lot, too. We all saw it (twice, actually) before all the hype began, so we felt we had "discovered" it on our own. We urged a whole bunch of folks to go see it and many of them loved it as well. Had we waited until now to see it, I might've been reluctant to go at all and, if I did choose to go, I'd probably be very cynical due to the hoopla. Would that affect my enjoyment? I don't know. I do know I never had the feeling of being manipulated that many others have commented on here, although I do commonly feel that way at other movies. Perhaps that explains my enjoyment: I was being manipulated without even knowing it!

Jim, I not only don't share your opinion of the movie, but it seems you had made up your mind beforehand and your stated reasons (or examples) seem more like cheap shots. I don't come here believing I will always agree with you, even though I quite often do. In this case, I guess I will just agree to disagree. And I will choose to chuckle at many (not all) of the nay-sayers here who reveal nothing more high-brow pretensions. Just because we liked it doesn't make us ignorant, unsophisticated dolts!

"Some have enjoyed the movie as a kind of gaudy fairy tale."

I think that about sums up "Slumdog Millionaire". It is nothing more than a rags to riches fairy tale. It's as a fairy tale that I found it most frustrating. If the movie could be stripped of it's game show structure, and of the unnecessary love story, and be left mainly with some of the early childhood sequences, it might have been good. It's in those sections that the movie is at it's best. The individual episodes seem to stack up well as a sort of portrait of "slumdog" life in Mumbai.

But all of this seems to be Boyle's great weakness. He's not able to trust an audience. Other readers have mentioned "Sunshine", which was pretty brilliant for the first 70%, and then it seemed like Mr. Boyle didn't expect his audiences to track with him any longer, and so he turned his film into a stupid horror flick. I think Boyle was genuinely interested in the culture and lifestyle of his characters, but I don't believe he thought his audience would be. He did think his audience would be interested in a big-hearted "good guy gets money and beautiful girl" story. He was right. Unfortunately, his instincts will probably take him all the way to a best picture award.

Danny Boyle = Alan Parker? Slumdog similar to Crash?

Ouch.

I can't say that I share your criticisms of Slumdog, Jim. You attack it's visual tone as being glossy, picturesque &qout;gritty,&qout; and then drive the point home by saying, &qout;This is Danny Boyle, slumming.&qout; I just don't think you got it right with this one. Danny Boyle isn't slumming, and that's by design.

I think that the title, Slumdog Millionaire, outlines the exact film that Danny Boyle made. The title is a complete contradiction and the style of the film builds right on top of it. It's a fantasy, a fairy tale. The characters and situation are somewhat cartoonish and the emotional impact is stilted. I didn't really feel too much of anything for the characters and situation other than what was forced on me... but that was okay here. It worked for me. If Slumdog had been directed in a more realistic tone, it might have been too much to take. Were people really supposed to feel something while watching Slumdog? Maybe I'd be disgusted by it too if I'd thought of the film that way (seriously; that's not intended as a snarky sentence).

I guess the film doesn't feel like another Mississippi Burning or Crash. Those films used one-note characters (we're killed a token black guy on film - doesn't that make you feel something?) but they presented their stories as reality. As important. I guess I give Boyle more credit - I think Alan Parker is clueless but I think Boyle utilizes his style with purpose and that Slumdog Millionaire isn't trying to be a &qout;message movie.&qout;

Do you think your opinion would be any different if the film hadn't received all the nominations? I ask this because I remember my experience with Crash - I came out of the theatre thinking it was contrived and unrealistic, that it beat me over the head with its themes, and that it was decades out of touch with the modern, more subtle, racism that occurs in America today. I didn't think it was terrible but I didn't really like it either. Then, when it got nominated for Oscars, my opinion soured (especially since A History of Violence was snubbed). When it won, I was outraged and my opinion of the film turned to complete disdain. Do you think your opinion of Slumdog would have been any more innocuous had you seen it early on? I really liked the film, but it's no Best Picture.

I'm much more disappointed seeing The Curious Case of Benjamin Button on the Oscar lists. I love David Fincher but boy did he get it wrong with Benjamin Button. Giving him a Best Director nod for this is akin to giving Scorsese one for The Departed (no, it's worse that that. I was trying to tie them together because both instances are an example of a great filmmaker being nominated for a film that was not great). I was very disappointed to not see Darren Aronofsky nominated for directing The Wrestler.

BTW, don't worry about venting or posting about films you hated. If a film elicits an opinion in you , good or bad, please share it! I've loved the posts you've made recently about TDK and this one as well. It seemed like you hadn't had a really strong opinion about a film since NCFOM. And, I have yet to find a critic who is as good with explaining their viewpoint than you. I really appreciate the fact that you know exactly what you felt and that you have a masterful ability to write about it. You are very precise with your words and you have the rare gift in making sure that they always mean something. I have no idea how you do it.

JE: Thanks much, haggie. I get what you're saying: "Slumdog" is lightweight entertainment, not trying to make a Big Statement. To me, though, the over-inflated, heavy-handed style was (how do I say this?) pretentious and trivializing at the same time -- like Alan Parker. Maybe it's that contradiction that I found so irritating and offensive. But now you've made me think of another moment I hated: the big Dutch-angle close-up of the blinded kid with Jamal approaching, out-of-focus, in the background. It telegraphed the whole scene before the scene even took place. Why not let Jamal discover the kid before he's shoved into our faces? (Also, when Jamal is at the terminal in the call center looking up the list of Salims in the database, I thought: Please just don't let him get the right one on the THIRD try. It's too neat. It's always the third try. I don't know -- maybe that's what makes it a "fairy tale.")

An open question: How did you, and members of your audience, respond to the initial confrontation between Jamal and Salim in the reunion scene at the skyscraper construction site? I laughed loud.

This is probably worth another post, but I was wondering the same thing about whether my response would have been different if I had seen the film earlier? Does my previous experience with the work of Danny Boyle prejudice me or prepare me for the film? Is this "backlash" to a film that has received a lot of attention, even though my expectations going in could not have been lower, given my opinion of Boyle's first few films? (I haven't seen "A Life Less Ordinary," "Millions" or "Sunshine," and have only watched the beginnings of "The Beach" and "28 Days Later...".) I don't know. On the one hand, my response might not have been as strong if I'd seen it before all the acclaim. (I thought "Crash" was ludicrous but well-intentioned the first time I saw it; not until I tried to get through it again did I find it unbearable. I hadn't remembered it being that BAD.) On the other hand, I probably wouldn't have gone out of my way to even write anything about it if it had just come and go like any other disposable release....

Anyway, thank you for your kind and thought-provoking words. I started off writing reviews for my college paper 32 years ago and because I still love movies I keep trying to find different ways of talking about them. Writing about them on text-only Prodigy for the first time 20 years ago, and developing written conversations, was one of the most exciting and rewarding developments for me -- a new kind of writing

thein:

"Jim, I don't know if Karlos was making straw-man arguments as much as he was following your reasoning to its ultimate, logical-but-absurd conclusion."

Thanks thein, that is what I was trying to do but...

Not only does it not go over well when communicating across the internet, rather than write in broad stokes to show what train of thought we feel a person's argument is speeding on, I think Jim wants me to just defend the specific examples from the film that are at question with as precise an explanation as we have to offer.

And he's right. I was being cheeky. I was out of line. Or 'out of order' as the British characters in Mike Leigh films say and I love the way it sounds.

Ps. Anybody else happy to see Mike Leigh get an original screenplay nod for "Happy-Go-Lucky"?
And how about Martin McDonagh for "In Bruges"?
And my personal favorite... Courtney Hunt for "Frozen River".
And "Wall-E" getting a screenplay nod is unique for an animated flick.

The original screenplay category was the best thing the Academy did. Although... I'm not sure Dustin Lance Black's "Milk" should be considered an 'original' screenplay... It is based on a well-documented true story...

Question--

For those who feel the movie was exploitative, why do you think it's gotten mostly very positive responses from people in India, including people familiar with the slum areas featured in the film? I'm asking seriously.

JE: The critical response has been mixed everywhere, including India (where it just opened today), but mostly positive. I thought this background story was interesting, especially its description of the movie's style. I hadn't seen anybody describe it as "realistic" before:

http://new.asianews.it/index.php?l=en&art=14292

The film succeeds in combining a realistic, British-style approach with the typical conventions of a Bollywood love story.

Many local personalities accuse the film of making a spectacle out of poverty in India, but director Danny Boyle defends himself by saying that his work is intended to show the "lust for life" in Mumbai.

Danny Boyle's style isn't exactly subtle, so I can see what you're saying about the visuals of the film, but I think he was only trying to show the vivacity, contradictions, and energy of Mumbai and its people. In Mumbai there's so much going on at once, where you're put into sensory overload, so it seems to me that that had a huge effect on how the film was shot. Danny admitted that the whole effect of the film was supposed to reflect the energy of Mumbai, and either people were going to leave the theater with a migraine or come out experiencing something exhilarating.

I guess you got the migraine.

Wow, I didn't realize Jim Emerson had a roving comment board dwelling band of sycophants.

Kudos to you sir.

JE: Yep, it's all about expressing unanimity of observation and opinion around here!

JE: But now you've made me think of another moment I hated: the big Dutch-angle close-up of the blinded kid with Jamal approaching, out-of-focus, in the background. It telegraphed the whole scene before the scene even took place. Why not let Jamal discover the kid before he's shoved into our faces?

I remember the scene but not that shot. The way you describe it, yeah, that sounds like it would have worked better if it had been presented in a different way. It's got to be a bit sloppier than that for me to notice on the first viewing unless I'm really not into the film and I'd be lying if I didn't say that Slumdog had a very solid grip on me.

JE: How did you, and members of your audience, respond to the initial confrontation between Jamal and Salim in the reunion scene at the skyscraper construction site? I laughed loud.

I was in a full, but tepid crowd. There was no audible reaction from anybody during the entire film. Personally, I reacted with an incredulous "whaaaaaat???" in my head. Nothing about their relationship worked for me from that point on but, again, I just went with it - I was still enjoying the movie immensely. Even worse is Salim's "bath" at the end. That moment made smirk, but not in a good way. Again, it rolled off my back - everything else still worked for me and that moment wasn't enough to drag it down.

On the way to the car, my wife asked me, "what do you think the significance was of Salim filling the bathtub with money?" I said, "Danny Boyle thought it would look cool."

JE: I thought "Crash" was ludicrous but well-intentioned the first time I saw it; not until I tried to get through it again did I find it unbearable. I hadn't remembered it being that BAD.

Uh-huh. I think we all know that feeling. It's nice when you know well enough to stay away from a second viewing. It's even better when a good film reveals itself as a great one on second viewing. I knew coming out of Slumdog that it was a one-time experience for me. I really enjoyed it but I know that further viewings will yield diminishing rewards. Fortunately, I've only seen Crash once.

Emerson,
I've been reading your blog for a while now, and naturally I disagree with you quite a bit, but I'm always willing to give you the benefit of the doubt because after all (and I'm not certain of this) you seem to be a protege of Roger Ebert, and there's no critic I respect more than Mr. Ebert. But after months of Dark Knight bashing and now this latest entry on Slumdog I just need to come out and say it: you're an elitist snob who seems to have forgotten the reason for going to the movies in the first place. I would give you a list of reasons why I think Slumdog is a great film, but I'm feeling a little to angry to be articulate at the moment.

P.S.
Do you go out to movies with the intent of trying as hard as you can to dislike them because that's the feeling I get whenever I read your writing.

Jim, I just wanted to point out that Millions, Sunshine and 28 Days Later are all excellent movies. Danny Boyle is different enough from film to film that you shouldn't let any of them dissuade you from watching any of the others. What you might find overly manipulative when dealing with reality (Shallow Grave, Trainspotting, Slumdog) could work very well in a sci-fi horror story (or a kid's movie).

Stay away from A Life Less Ordinary and The Beach, though, they're absolutely abysmal.

I just saw "Slumdog Millionaire". It was not the greatest film I have seen from the year 2008, by far: "The Dark Knight" was the best (followed by "The Wrestler"). However, I did not detest "Slumdog", nor do I detest "Benjamin Button" (ughh). Yet...

...People make such a to-do about the Academy Awards and all those other shows. "Benjamin Button" (as many have stated, a "Forrest Gump" rehash) and "Slumdog" do not deserve Best Picture on any accolade ballot. I just do not get it. When I look at the Oscars, I see something that did not award "City of God", "2001: A Space Odyssey", "Pan's Labyrinth", "Nashville", "Army of Shadows", or "The Grey Zone" with any decent (much less major) awards...I see politics and pockets and dripping chins...it is what it is.

"Slumdog Millionaire" will more than likely win Best Picture for the Oscars like it did for the Golden Globes. "The Dark Knight", which has grossed about a billion dollars (more than all the Best Picture nominees combined, and then some), does not need one award of the eight it is nominated for. "Slumdog" needs what it can get. And so it goes, as it has before.

On the other hand, I will drink a beer to Richard Jenkins being nominated for "The Visitor" and to Mickey Rourke hopefully winning for "The Wrestler".

I don't think it's fair to view a film with prejudice. And I don't understand on what basis one would avoid Danny Boyle when one hasn't seen, say, his work from the last 13 years. If one hasn't seen "A Life Less Ordinary," "Millions" or "Sunshine" and "only watched the beginnings of 'The Beach' and '28 Days Later...'" then how would he know to avoid Boyle? I guess "Trainspotting" and maybe "Shallow Grave" might turn someone off to Boyle for life--but, if I let "The Hudsucker Proxy" turn me off to the Coen brothers for life, I would have missed "Fargo" and "No Country for Old Men."

That's not to suggest I think "Slumdog Millionaire" is the equal of "Fargo" or "NCFOM." However, I do think "SM" to be entertaining--and if I was manipulated by it, I was manipulated skillfully.

JE: I agree with you in principle, and you pose an interesting question, which I addressed in other comments: How do you disassociate yourself from your experience of a filmmaker's previous work? A new film may surprise you, but you don't often go in without remembering what you liked or disliked about earlier films by the same director (or writer, or actor). Those first two Boyle films were indeed enough for me to get a sense of the director's abilities. I think I might like "28 Days" -- but the first time I tried to watch it a stupid monkey trick at the beginning made me turn it off in disgust. I'm probably hypersensitive to what I don't like about Boyle. On the other hand, I didn't have to see more than two Michael Bay or Kevin Smith or Henry Jaglom movies to know they weren't for me, either. However, I'm always willing to take another look if people I respect tell me I should give a filmmaker another shot. (I don't HAVE to see everything anymore, as I did for years. Not being a daily newspaper film critic is much more like being a regular moviegoer in that respect.) I don't know many people who were very enthusiastic about "Slumdog," but it looked like an Oscar favorite, so I made an effort to see it before the nominations.

Gotta say: I didn't hate this movie quite as much as you, Jim ("Not since 'Crash'-- or possibly 'Mississippi Burning' -- has a movie packaged brutality in slicker, shinier, tighter shrink-wrap"), but I'm inclined to agree with Owen Gleiberman at EW, who asserts the movie ennobles poverty in its slick portrayal of Jamal's destitution, which enables him to correctly answer all the questions on Who Wants to Be a Millionaire and thus allows him to rise above his circumstances.

At its core, Slumdog Millionaire is a Dickensian fairy tale with a globalized backdrop. But take away this backdrop, and I swear it wouldn't be garnering even half the praise it's getting now. The notion of a post-globalized world is a worthy subject for a film, but this one uses its locale not as a springboard for complex interrogation but merely as an exotic background for the events that transpire. In typical Boyle fashion, the plot points pass at too quick a clip to provoke much thought, but any careful analysis of the film reveals just how hollow it really is.

As we all know the Oscars blew it this year. In a perfect world this is what would have happened.

Best Picture

Synecdoche, New York
Wall-E
The Wrestler
The Dark Knight
Happy Go Lucky

Best Director

Guy Maddin (My Winnipeg)
Arnaud Desplechin (A Christmas Tale)
Christopher Nolan (The Dark Knight)
Daren Aronofsky (The Wrestler)
Ari Folman (Waltz with Bashir)

Original Screenplay

Charlie Kauffman (Synecdoche, New York)
Joel and Ethan Coen (Burn after Reading)
Martin McDonagh (In Bruges)
Arnaud Desplechin (A Christmas Tale)
Mike Leigh (Happy Go Lucky)

Adapted Screenplay

Jonathan and Christopher Nolan (The Dark Knight)
François Bégaudeau (The Class)
Maurizio Braucci, Ugo Chiti, Gianni Di Gregorio, Matteo Garrone, Massimo Gaudioso & Roberto Saviano (Gomorra)
Peter Buchman and Benjamin A. van der Veen (Che)
John Ajvide Lindqvist (Let the Right One In)

Best Actor

Richard Jenkins (The Visitor)
Micheal Fassbender (Hunger)
Brendan Gleason (In Burges)
Sean Penn (Milk)
Mickey Rourke (The Wrestler)

Best Actress

Michele Williams (Wendy and Lucy)
Anne Hathaway (Rachel Getting Married)
Sally Hawkins (Happy Go Lucky)
Kirstin Scott Thomas (I’ve Loved You So Long)
Melissa Leo (Frozen River)

Best Supporting Actor

Heath Ledger (The Dark Knight)
Robert Downey Jr. (Tropic Thunder)
Michael Shannon (Revolutionary Road)
Eddie Marsden (Happy Go Lucky)
Jim Myron Ross (Ballast)

Best Supporting Actress

Penelope Cruz (Vicky Cristina Barcelona)
Viola Davis (Doubt)
Rosemarie Dewitt (Rachel Getting Married)
Samantha Morton (Synecdoche, New York)
Mila Kunis (Forgetting Sarah Marshall)

Comment on my picks and post your own.
I want your opinions.

*you're an elitist snob who seems to have forgotten the reason for going to the movies in the first place. *

Note to Jim: Ignore Slumdog Millionaire at Your Own Peril!

It is one of the best movies ever made, a life changing experience. It is, for a fact, one of the very best reviewed movies of the year. It is fast becoming the new mold from which all movies will be poured. Its impact, its influence on cinema will be felt for decades to come.

Hey Christopher, I agree. "Slumdog Millionaire" was a life changing experience. It wasted two hours of my life I will never get back! It is the most digusting fantasia culled from poverty since "Oliver!". One dimensional characters, a lack of suspense, and boring as hell. And the end credits are the height self-congratulatory cheese. It saddens me to see Boyle getting recognition for this gunk, while his direction of an excellent motion picture like "Trainspotting" was ignored by the Academy. Yet we see the man rewarded for over-directed, warmed-over, third rate sentimentality. And the slate for Best Picture this year makes 2006 look good. But then again, '06 had "Munich", which is one of Spielberg's best.

A thoughtful entry, as usual, Jim.

I always judge a movie, first and foremost, as to whether or not it delivered an entertaining experience. Then I judge it critically.

The movie was entertaining. I cared about the characters. It was a satisfying experience. it did not pretend to be anything more than what it was.

I found the film to be like Boyle's other works that I've seen -- namely, it crackles. It's electric. It's exhilirating filmmaking.

I think a stylistic argument can be made that the glossiness of the film reflects the fact that Jamal refuses to give in. He's eternally optimistic.

As to the other posts here, I definitely see what folks are complaining about and agree to some extent. Either you see Boyle's style as heavy-handed or you don't. I happen to have liked Trainspotting, 28 Days Later, and Sunshine. Boyle is all about style. That's fine with me if the movie delivers as an entertainment.

But in retrospect, all the characters in those movies lack depth and they ultimately do in Slumdog, as well. Again, while that may be appropriate for the material -- in that this is essentially a rags-to-riches fable -- that doesn't elevate it to the level of art, nor does it mean it should be held up as a great example of true cinema.

But to echo others here, the difference between Slumdog and Crash (which I also DESPISED) was that it lacked the pretension of the latter. We were meant to see Crash as "important", when it...well...you know the rest.

I'd even call Gran Torino a better film because the entire movie is a riff on Eastwood's entire iconoclastic status, as predictable and cloying as it is.

I'm just throwing in my vote that I think Slumdog Millionaire is fairly over-rated but I think Danny Boyle is a completely serviceable director. I do think he's a very mainstream director, but he (usually) lacks the cynicism in his filmmaking that annoys me with most mainstream fare.

Slumdog Millionaire, however, really bothers me for how overtly manipulative, simplistic, and predictable it is. Audiences love it, critics seem to generally adore it, and I appreciate Boyle's interest in portraying the skyrocketing evolution of India into a First World nation, but I can't help but feel that he's definitely in Alan Parker territory here. Boyle paints in ridiculously broad strokes and reduces all the emotional and thematic complexity to black and white hatted characters and moralistic preaching at the audience. The first hour of the movie was fun, the second half slowly drove me crazy.

Oh well, I'd prefer it to win over Frost/Nixon.

I didn't know much about "Slumdog Millionaire" when I saw that it was playing in my area about a month ago, other than it's critical acclaim. Nothing about Danny Boyle, not a lot about what was actually supposed to happen in the movie. I have to admit I had a great time and left the theater feeling a certain kind of happiness I don't often feel. My favorite of the year? Certainly not (I had a feeling nothing was gonna top "In Bruges" for me personally upon seeing it back towards the beginning of the year), but it did fulfill a certain something for me.

In regards to disassociating yourself with a director's previous work... I'm not so sure you should. It's an interestig discussion, one worthy of it's own post, but if you see something you like/dislike in a work and can back it up then I see no problem. Take Ebert's history with David Lynch. Do you think he ever went to a screening and didn't think about what he knew he didn't like about Lynch's previous work? The first paragraph of his review for "Wild at Heart": "There is something inside of me that resists the films of David Lynch. I am aware of it, I admit to it, but I cannot think my way around it. I sit and watch his films and am aware of his energy, his visual flair, his flashes of wit. But as the movie rolls along, something grows inside of me - an indignation, an unwillingness, a resistance. At the end of both "Blue Velvet" and "Wild at Heart," I was angry, as if a clever con-man had tried to put one over on me." It's not as if he is simply out to simply trash Lynch's work, he reports what he sees (that goes for "The Straight Story" and "Mulholland Drive" too).

Wow, Jim. The audience during my viewing of Slumdog broke out in a thunderous round of applause when the movie ended, and *before* the Bollywood number. I've yet to talk to one person who has seen Slumdog and hated it; on the contrary, I've heard nothing but universal praise for the film.

You're in the minority on this one, which is fine; Ebert himself has even said that sometimes you need to pay attention to the few dissenting voices, because they may have better insight to a film than the masses that heap praise upon it.

But, I suppose what suprises me so much about your comments is the level of derision behind them; you usually don't strike me as being so, well, nasty. I can understand not caring for a film, but it seems it would take a person with a heart of solid stone to come across as so hateful toward a movie like Slumdog. I mean, Jesus, it's not like Danny Boyle directed The Love Guru.

*critics seem to generally adore it,*

I wonder how true this is. The old standby is the Tomato Meter which says 94% of the critics in the Meter gave it a fresh review. And it won a few critic society awards so certainly there are a lot of critics out there who like it.

But, as is often the case, there's a divide between the critics represented in the meter (a combination of newspaper critics and people with their own websites) and those who write for magazines such as Film Comment, Cineaste, etc.

When I leaf through these magazines, I see very few critics (some of whom overlap with the Meter critics) who are overly enthusiastic about Slumdog.

Out of 50 critics' lists in Sight & Sound, only 2 listed Slumdog. This doesn't mean more of these critics didn't also like Slumdog - these were mostly Top 5 lists and not putting Slumdog in your top 5 doesn't mean you didn't like it.

But looking through this month's Film Comment, I see Slumdog appearing on precisely 1 top ten list of all the ones listed. At this point, we're talking about 3 out of approximately 75 critics in these two magazines who counted Slumdog as one of the very best movies of the year.

Obviously some of the Film Comment critics listed Slumdog somewhere in their Top 20 (only Top 10s were printed, and not all of them) because it placed 38th in the Top 50:

http://www.filmlinc.com/fcm/jf09/ct50.htm

(Hooray for Wendy and Lucy winning!)

I'm not saying being on a Top 10 list or not is a measure of quality. I'm only talking about critical reception. I'm frequently surprised at the difference between the "Tomato Meter world" of critics and the rest. There are plenty of fine critics represented in the Meter including some of the most influential ones (Ebert, Dargis, etc.), but I tend to pay more attention to the ones who participated in the Film Comment poll.

Is Slumdog as adored by critics as the 94% reading suggests? I'd say no. But you certainly have to call its critical reception positive overall.

JE: I was searching for reviews in India and the UK (it's a UK production, with British actors a British leading man) and although the sentiments were generally positive (some with reservations about the portrayal of poverty and violence), a minority strongly objected. Few, however, on the primary grounds that I do, which is that I find Boyle's hyper-heavy-handed style abusive and suffocating rather than "fairy tale"-like. I think he crosses the aesthetic line between manipulation (which all movies do) and... coercion, between persuasion and abuse. It can be a fine line. Boyle just tramples it.

I get it, I get it. Controversy sells. You're new, under the wing of a great, and you need to justify your role by the amount of hits you get to your site.
Congratulations to you.

JE: Thanks. Yeah, I'm new. Only been doing this for 30+ years, at RogerEbert.com since its inception in 2004, blogging on this platform since 2006. It's amazing to me that people think saying something unpopular automatically generates more traffic. It ain't necessarily so. More comments sometimes, not always more hits.

Jim, I am highly disappointed. Slumdog Millionaire is a fairy tale. A contemporary Capra-esque, Dickensian uplifting story of love. What is so bad about that? Your top 10 of the year show your predilection towards dark, less optimistic material. But I loved Slumdog Millionaire, because it is a celebration of life, told with color, and charm just like Indian culture at its finest. Maybe it is time to ignore Pauline Kael, and turn that frown upside down.

I had some knee jerk reactions to some things in "Slumdog Millionaire" I have to admit. Especially the shot near then end of pouring money into the bathtub and lying in it. Sometimes Boyle's need to be poetic is taken to the literal extreme. "Oh! Is that what he lived his life for!!" This problem popped up at the end of "Sunshine" and "28 Days Later", when style was supposed to be substance - but the substance became convoluted which in turn sent the style reeling into delirium; both films I really liked until the final few moments.

But there were some things that were extraordinarily well handled in "Slumdog". As you did with "TDK", I'll pick a specific point to digest. During one of the game show scenes, in an intense moment, Boyle doesn't move the camera in on the actor's face, instead! He gets a shot of the television camera moving in on the "Jamal", though Jamal's entire body is hidden by the camera. While at points, yes, he strove to use simple techniques of film to connect with the audience, he was also then allowed to turn those simple techniques on their heads.

My biggest reaction to the film was about how smartly it was packaged. You got the sense that the filmmaker really wanted to tell this story, but knew that unless you package it properly, for a wide audience, it will never get made. Working in the business right now, it's more true than ever. Popular game show, old school romance, glamorized poverty overcome...allowed this movie to get made...which allowed Boyle to do some really great stuff within the packaged content. My opinion.

I found it funny how you always wait until after all the reviews have come in to criticize a movie that gets a lot of good reviews. Not to say you don't give movies good reviews that get a lot of good reviews, but it always seems like you need to backlash on something, but you have to wait until just about everybody's reviewed the movie to comment.

JE: Well, I explained why I waited so long to see "Slumdog." But you have a point: Contrary to what some here have speculated, I usually don't feel compelled to write about a movie if I don't like it much. If I see it before its theatrical release, or sometime early on, and it doesn't particularly excite me, I try to find something else to write about that does. In the case of "Slumdog" I wasn't originally interested in seeing it, but after all the attention it has received (and before the Oscar nominations were announced), I finally decided I should, just to see what all the fuss was about. As I wrote, I was surprised at how much I disliked it from the start. In the case of "The Dark Knight," I saw it early in its theatrical run, wrote about it in July, and then revisited it after it was released on DVD/Blu-ray and pay-per-view, and a week before its nationwide re-release in theaters and IMAX. After I'd studied it a couple more times at home, trying to figure out what I hadn't been able to figure out in my original theatrical viewing, I found I had more to say about it. Maybe that's being contrarian. Or maybe it's an attempt to broaden discussion of established "hits." Or both and more...

Jim, I agree about Danny Boyle. He's got more energy than taste. His films move but they're not moving to me. And yet I can't write him off entirely if only because he produced Alan Clarke's Elephant, a film that wouldn't exist without him.

at last, a critic who despised "slumdog millionaire!" i was beginning to think i missed something.

while i agree with everything you said, my biggest complaint is how morally irresponsible an therefore offensive the film is. it does for poverty in india what "pretty woman" does for prostitution.

and all with a pretty bow on top.

JE: I was searching for reviews in India and the UK (it's a UK production, with British actors)

Just FYI....except for the lead guy, Dev Patel, who is British. Everybody else in the movie is from India, and are not British! Please get your facts straight. Thanks

JE: Thank you. I'll re-phrase that.

Jim, a part of me thinks that your intense dislike for the film may have something to do with the hype and expectations piled on the it. Is it possible that you wouldn't have hated the film so much if you had seen it when it was first released, before all the public gushing over it? Is it possible that what could have been minor dislike on your part, increased to hate because it bothered you how people could LOVE the film?

I also disagree with you about the shallow casting. The police inspector played by Irrfan Khan, for example, isn't slimy looking, and near the end you sense that he has some humanity in him, as he comes to really listen, and become interested in Jamal's story.

I also disagree with you about what you call the flat structure of the question and flashback story line. Sometimes the answer is revealed to us by Jamal on the quiz show before the flashback explains how he knew the answer. Conversely, we are at times shown the flashback first before he answers the question.

I do however, understand why you would have an issue with Boyle's directing style, which can be over the top. I think his purpose in this case was to show a heightened reality visually of Mumbai, which lends a boldness to the film. He could have gone in the opposite direction and chosen a more desaturated color palette and more subtle camera angles, shots, etc., but wouldn't that in itself be stylizing the film anyways?

I do think your protest about feeling manipulated by the film is valid, but I guess I enjoyed it, even if I knew at some level I was being emotionally manipulated. I also like how the film isn't pretending to be important (unlike CRASH). The film's lack of cynicism won me over.

On another note, I really like how instead of how most movies have the typical flashback of someone dying on their deathbed, or reminiscing in old age (ie. in Benjamin Button), we have the flashbacks of a young man who still has his whole future ahead of him. He isn't tied down by his memories. I like that.

Oh well, you'll probably go on to hate the movie, and that's okay too. I hated Benjamin Button and nothing anyone says will change my mind about it, but I might give it another chance.

Interesting note:

Salman Rushdie did a very poor job of predicting the Oscar nominees this year, but I have to admit that I like his picks better than the actual ones:

http://carpetbagger.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/01/06/salman-rushdie-oscar-prognosticator/

Oddly enough, his pick for Best Picture is The Dark Knight, but he's with you on Slumdog Millionaire.

Jim-

My biggest issue with your review here (and, really, in others I've read) is that I have no clue after reading just the review what made the film bad to you.

Yeah, you pick apart its style. Problem is, not one of those issues, as stated, is inherently bad. You don't like em, but even some of the ways you phrase your criticisms could be inserted into a positive review without anyone taking notice; "The good characters are pretty, the mean ones are distinguished by cosmetic irregularities" is an observation of fact, not a positive or negative quality. Ebert made similar observations in his 4-star reviews of Kill Bill Vol. 1 and Sin City.

Reading through the comments I got a better feel for your issues. I don't agree with them (I loved the movie immensely), but I've long resigned myself to the fact that "Slumdog Millionaire" will be one of those movies whose quality will be debated over long into the future, especially if it wins Best Picture and feels a backlash. Frankly, I'm surprised it hasn't been MORE divisive; hyper-stylized movies usually are.

I think part of the issue many have is that the film borders on fantasy without ever fully diving into the impossible, like magical realism. As a result, the movie is a pseudo-fantasy that, at face value, comes off as needing to manipulate to maintain any sort of logic. I have friends who had issues with the film at that level. I ran with the movie, and accepted it on its own terms, on that edge.

Well I have to say that I liked the movie, a lot actually. It dosen't make it the best of this or any other year and it did seem a bit shallow. It looks great but i think he relied to heavily on the aesthetic quality and not enough on substance. The characters are never seem fully developed, and as gritty as it tried to be it was never all that realistic. I also didn't care for the romance and after I saw it my first reaction was that Danny Boyle was probably a big fan of City of god (a much better movie) and tried to make his own version of it. Yet it's still enjoyable visually it's stunning and he brought a lot of beauty to parts of the world that aren't beautiful and the technique worked with showing how he got the answers, but i never cared for that storyline or how quickly he managed to get himself booked on millionare after they capture Frida Pinto. I mean really what did he just manage to get booked the next day and end up on tv. The movie was full of arbitrary moves but if you dont nitpick at it I think people will enjoy it.
ps. I hated the scene with the money in the bathtub, it made no sense I kept thinking he was gonna lit himself on fire!

"An open question: How did you, and members of your audience, respond to the initial confrontation between Jamal and Salim in the reunion scene at the skyscraper construction site? I laughed loud."

Are you referring to Jamal's daydream of punching Salim and throwing both his brother and himself off of the half-constructed building? Yes, I laughed. But I believe it was meant to be funny. Did you mean that you laughed AT the scene or WITH it?

This blog is a testament to jimmy emerson's idiocy as a film critic. Here's the guy who gave trash like the descent four starts and now she "detests" Slumdog?!

Jim, I very much disagree. As many people did with "Crash," this movie may be destined to be misunderstood. This is a Dickensian fairy-tale, not a gritty urban drama. It is BOTH authentic in its locales and color palates and characters AND slick in its presentation. It shows us the cruelty of the world its characters inhabit - for instance, when a man drugs a child and plucks out his eye - without being gratuitous and without moving outside the bonds of its classic nature. The film is daring in its boundless hopefulness. Danny Boyle has a visual flair that moves this story and these characters. We're dealig with rags-to-riches, eternal love, and a boy who wades through feces to see a TV star. This is a great film. It is not a perfect film, but what do I care? Since the moment I saw it in Toronto, I knew it was special, had provided me with a wholly unique and wonderful experience, and, also like "Crash" seemed destined NOT to be nominated for anything. I don't think anyone can claim it was made to be Oscar-bait, that just isn't Danny Boyle's game. He made a classic story, yes, but after last year's tandem of "No Country For Old Men" and "There Will Be Blood" why would he assume that that would equal Oscars? The movie is finding its audience, and it is a large audience. It is an audience who, many times, would never find themselves interested in a movie with GASP! subtitles for much of it. Or a movie EEK! about the plight of Indian children. Not your typical movie. Just a classic one.

Many filmmakers set out to create characters that are intentionally gray. Critics tend to ascribe a certain level of sophistication to these types of films. But how is such a film any less manipulative than say, a Slumdog Millionaire? I would argue that Frost/Nixon is just as manipulative as Slumdog, even more so perhaps because while Slumdog isn't hiding it's hand, Frost/Nixon plays it's cards close to the vest, wanting to portray itself as objective, while at the same time requiring fictitious elements to help manipulate the appeal of it's story. It seems to me what you're really saying is that you prefer your manipulations subtle, or invisible even.

JE: I agree. Every movie ever made is an exercise in manipulation, an assemblage of sounds and images designed to have some effect on the viewer. The next steps to consider are: Did it work for you, as one of those viewers? Why or why not? To what end? "Frost/Nixon" probably isn't the best example to contrast with "Slumdog" since, as you say, it's also pretty blatant about the games it's playing, although Ron Howard's directorial approach is not as aggressively in-your-face as Boyle's. But, yes, some movies are less obvious about it, and some give you more room to interpret or explore more complex or ambivalent emotions about certain characters or situations. And, again, sometimes that works and sometimes it doesn't. As Roger Ebert likes to say, a movie isn't about what it is about, it's about how it is about it.

Picky picky picky. How do you people enjoy anything? When it comes to film criticism, I feel like a social party user. I get drunk on Rotten Tomatoes, smoke a little Ebert hash now and then. Then I stumble into the back room at Scanners, filled with dying heroin addicts, squirting their excess blood on the floor. "Yeah, Dark Knight was rubbish because of the school bus. I totally hate every Danny Boyle movie because his shots have too much style. 28 Days Later was terrible because of the monkey at the beginning, so now I can't watch another movie by the same guy."

Seriously, you need to see some BAD movies or just quit cold turkey for awhile. Start on a diet of the recent spoof flicks to shock your system. Watch more TV. There's still hope. Maybe go on a Ron Howard methadone maintenance program.

You call Slumdog's style "pretentious", yet you loved "Paranoid Park" by Gus Van Sant, which was ACTUALLY PRETENTIOUS and not only in the style...

I think you liked "Paranoid Park" only because it was about white boy, sub-urban angst, so when you see something like "Slumdog" you get upset because its about people who are actually suffering.

Same goes with "Shotgun Stories" which is once again pretentious whitey dreck.

Life-long love story? Homeless orphans being abused for the profit of low-life criminals? Improbable rags-to-riches story? A colorful city with major poverty issues and stark class distinctions? Yeah, Slumdog Millionaire is about as manipulative and one dimensional as anything by that British literary hack, Charles Dickens.

JE. Yeah. If Dickens had written in the style of Jackie Collins.

Just saw the film, thought it was quite impressive. A really phenomenal story to me.

I think the violence was perceived however you wanted to perceive it. I wanted to root for the character going in, mainly because I'm a big Danny Boyle fan. You went in not wanting to like the movie, so the violence struck you as something that was made sadistic. I saw it as something devastating for the character and painful for me as an empathetic viewer.

If someone hated Jonathan Kaplan, they could just as easily have said that The Accused made gang rape look like a constructive group activity, or appealed to the audiences' prurient interests. That sounds ridiculous, but some people would be turned on by that horrific scene. Yet, that doesn't mean for a second that the director wanted to turn people on by a graphic rape scene.

In that same line of thinking, I don't think it's fair to accuse someone of glamorizing brutality just because you didn't want to like the movie. If you're going to accuse a director of glamorizing violence, why don't you aim your sights on James Bond, the Saw franchise, any and all comic book movies made in the last 20 years, or even the Chronicles of Narnia?

There are legitimate complaints to have about this film, but glamorizing violence is no where close to being on that short list.

JE: That it "glamorizes" violence is not really my complaint (although I do have to wonder why that execution is shot through the patterned pillow fabric). Watch the way Kaplan shoots and edits the rape scene in "Accused." How is the style -- the framing, the cutting, the use of color -- anything like, say, the opening sequence of "Slumdog" that I described? The two movies are up to completely different things (not the least of which is that "Slumdog" is a romantic fairy tale set in India with a musical number over the end credits and "The Accused" is a drama that centers around a rape trial in the American northwest). Such comparisons or generalizations (both scenes show acts of violence) can wind up being quite misleading.

Wow - I wish I wasn't so late to the party - but oh well ... here's my two cents.

I rarely agree with Jim so wholeheartedly - but I do here. I've been made to feel like a callow curmudgeon for having the audacity to tell people in the office, or online friends, that I didn't appreciate this movie. Everyone is so ga-ga over the damn thing.

I actually thought it was OK - but so far from great. My instant reaction to it was just that the tone was all wrong ... I understand dark humor, believe me - and I understand that there was a fairy tale nature to it all ... That's fine. ... But this mixed scenes of fairy tale, with scenes of complete brutality and a horrible existence, with nothing in between. The horrible scenes were not darkly funny - they were just horrible. It's not cute, in any way, that he got the quiz answers as a result of all of these scenes - they are just terrible episodes in his life. It just didn't go together at all ... and you could say "that was the point" - but I don't think so.

I'm not articulating well at this hour - but there you go ...

Jim, what was your opinion of Trainspotting? Does Boyle's style work any better for you in the context of that film? I only ask because, in my opinion, that's a film where Boyle's style is perfectly suited. It seems like less of a case of translating a screenplay into his style than it being a very fitting way to film that specific story about a group of heroin addicts.

JE: Yes, I thought it worked better in that film, and there were moments I loved ("Lust for Life" being one of them). But I still thought it was too slick, like a Nike ad. It's a matter of personal taste. I don't like the old Canadian band Rush, either, so even if they do cover versions of songs I love, I'm probably not going to like what they do with them!

JE wrote in a previous comment to haggie:

"JE: Yes, I thought it worked better in that film, and there were moments I loved ("Lust for Life" being one of them). But I still thought it was too slick, like a Nike ad. It's a matter of personal taste. I don't like the old Canadian band Rush, either, so even if they do cover versions of songs I love, I'm probably not going to like what they do with them!"

Holy crap! You don't like Rush!? Now I can never read another of your blog entries...cognitive dissonance in this case means favoring Rush. Sorry (tongue-in-cheek).

no matter what the picture is, a side effect of gushing popularity will always be a short list (yes, a short one) of detractors - nearly every one of whom whine on message boards like this one. they are out for dark knight (not my cup of tea,) they were out for titanic (loved it) and they're now out for slumdog (loved it, too.) if godfather was released next oscar season, there'd be people criticizing all aspects of that film, too. just check imdb. you can find people who despise any film and they often mount there high horse to tell you about it. I have not enjoyed a single comic book movie and my attention span wanes from the opening frames of anything animated. what does that amount to?? absolutely nothing except for the fact that it is (as you say) a matter of personal taste. you people who dislike slumdog are not special.. and please come to terms with the fact as a detractor of the film, you are in the minority.

Jim - you basically sold yourself out here in your reply to haggie. "I don't like the old Canadian band Rush, either, so even if they do cover versions of songs I love, I'm probably not going to like what they do with them!" Yes, film criticism is a matter of tastes, preferences, and opinions, but what you're saying is, you wouldn't like anything directed by Danny Boyle even if he were handed the world's best screenplay and was going to work with the most talented actors. Your "opinion" is a preconceived bias, which renders it pretty much useless.

JE: That strikes me as a mighty strange way of looking at the art and craft of film direction, but it's your "opinion." I suppose it's possible for actors and a script to overcome insensitive or overbearing direction, but I sure haven't seen many examples that I can think of.

Wow! I was planning to watch Slumdog. But now, with all these heated arguments and insights... I'm the type of guy that loves those slow, contemplative, brooding-atmosphere-type of European films. I'm afraid I might waste my $10 (movie ticket price down here in the Caribbean) with Slumdog! Should I? Shouldn't I? Should I?...

Jim,

I can think of a few examples of actors overcoming bad or indifferent direction, and I think it happens in comedy. I'm thinking of the Marx Brothers after they went to Warners. These films weren't as good as their inspired earlier work, but even with a middling director like Sam Wood, they produced some great material. The obvious argument here is that in this case the performers are rightly considered the auteurs of the film rather than the director (though we can't exactly dismiss the importance of the writers.) In general the "performative" films (featuring comedy acts, athletes like martial artists, etc.) probably fall into this category.

It's extremely difficult to think of an instance when a great script alone can overcome poor direction. I sure can't think of one.

To Brad W's point,

You're not wrong, but, with all due respect, so what? I can't stand Slumdog for many of the reasons Jim has expanded on. I'm in the minority. My opinion on Slumdog is not of any great import to the world, to the filmgoing public at large or to anyone other than me and perhaps a few friends, acquaintances and readers. Agreed. So what? Does that mean it's not fair game, or that it's important for me to "know my place" when making an argument about Slumdog?

Granted, I'm more likely to be vocal about films like this come awards time because there's the added element of feeling there's a kind of "injustice" being done when films like this get praised and other more worthy films get dismissed because of it. But again, so what? _I_ am interested in talking about what I perceive as the film's significant shortcomings. It's a subject that interests _me._

And for the record, I don't like Godfather either. :)

JE: Sam Wood -- good example! He's not as aggressively styley as Boyle, but I take your point. It's scary how little control actors have over how their performances appear in the final film, so I guess it's good to point out that even otherwise indifferent or hacky direction can result in the assembly of a good performance.

to chris long - point taken. 'so what?' is right. for every intelligent post that discusses the shortcomings (as you would like to call them :-) ,) there are 3 posts that say something like, "oh my god. i hated this movie, too." or "nobody I know likes this movie." really? is that person living in a box?? or "this is the type of crowd pleaser that grandmas recommend." a lot of dumb posts... and i find them quite annoying. i don't think that these people want to be in the minority - they don't want to be alone in disliking an immensely popular film. it's almost like they convene on a msg board like this to console each other. that is what i meant by - please come to terms with the fact that you are in the minority. this type of backlash is just getting so old. start a web site. seek therapy or something. nobody gets all goofy with their reasoning for why they disliked... idk, "doubt" or "revolutionary road."

you are sidestepping my point, jim. i have not liked and most probably would not like anything directed by kevin smith. i would walk into the theater w/ a preconceived bias, just as you did here. you should have wrote this blog entry before seeing the movie because this poor slumdog never stood a chance.

JE: I thought it might be more humane, like the one Alan Parker movie that even people who hate Alan Parker can enjoy, "The Commitments." Truth is, though, I could not have anticipated what Boyle actually did. It's still in the overblown style I find so suffocating (Boyle is the directorial equivalent of a Close Talker), but I couldn't have imagined how far he'd take it. As I said, though, I probably wouldn't have bothered writing about it if it hadn't suddenly become the Oscar favorite.

JE: the one Alan Parker movie that even people who hate Alan Parker can enjoy

Haven't seen The Commitments but I will stick up for Pink Floyd: The Wall.

ok. fair enough. i hear what you are saying about boyle's style. i don't recall much of it, but i remember being excited to see "a life less ordinary" after boyle had done "shallow grave" and "trainspotting." turned out to be one of the worst movies i have ever seen in my life!

I just saw this. I felt kind of sheepish afterwards. Because I did not particularly care for the movie, but not because of stylistic or moral outrage. I thought it's story was weird and vague, as were it's characters. Is this a fairy-tale, or a gritty film? It's got the grit...but has cardboard thin characters. Apparantly, the movie is a love story. I say apparantly because I felt that was totally unmotivated in the film, came out of the blue, and was never convincing. The sacrifice of the borther is supposed to be tragic and important...it came off as, once again, unmotivated and just plain weird. A person dying in a tub full of money should tell us something about this man, about his regrets. All it did was feel like the filmmakers wanted us to think that he was making amends for the money he made. Didn't work.
The final dance sequence was fun and nice...but it felt totally strapped on. Not at all the orgasmic finale it was supposed to be (I assume). Felt like 'Well, we're in India. Why not?'. No character in it, it's the same actors fullfilling Boyle's Bollywood dream.

I think the film failed on a screenplay level. It's stylistic flourishes didn't particularly grate me. I was too confused by having not a clue why they thought I cared about these people in this way.

I've been reading your articles for awhile, Mr. Emerson. You strike me less a film-lover and more of a real-life version of Anton Ego (from Ratatouille), if he worked in movies: you don't LIKE Movies, you LOVE them. If I don't LOVE them, you don't SWALLOW. The only problem is, much like Mr. Ego, you assume everyone who doesn't agree with you is a fool, or worse. Also, you're not as witty as Peter O'Toole, although I won't hold that against you, because neither is anyone else.

I was dragged to Slumdog Millionaire reluctantly and, yes, I found myself 'surrendering' to the experience. One also 'surrenders' to Bridge Over River Kwai and The Godfather. I was completely involved emotionally with what was going on. The dramatic structure kept me guessing (emotionally) the whole time, even though intellectually, I realized it had to have a happy ending. Yes, I loved it, and I credit Danny Boyle for crafting the emotional journey.

Thank God there are people like you, Mr. Emerson, to mock me and my emotions. It amazes me that you write about movies, since you hate so many of them.

And by the way? Pineapple Express isn't that good. It falls apart in the last thirty minutes. It doesn't become a stoner parody of a bad action movie, it just BECOMES a bad action movie with stoners in it.

(If you're Ego, does that make Ebert Gusteau?)

Jim, honestly.. With all the garbage being churned out of hollywood, is Slumdog Millionaire really worth complaining about? For me, Slumdog was a breath of fresh air. Not only that, but it gave me a sense of satisfaction inside that I remember having back when Crouching Tiger came out.. that many people are enjoying the movies right now. Everyone that I have directed to go see it told me they loved it and thanked me for the reccomendation. This isn't to say that (i say this in spite of not wanting to) it will be Everyone's cup of tea. I think it was Chapelle who said, "Well, you can't please em all." Regardless, I think you might agree with me Jim that there is MUCH more to complain about right now than Slumdog Millionaire. If Slumdog is truly a worthy bone of contention in our generation of film then we must be at a pinnacle in the history of movies. Yet, you and I both know that we're not, for there should be by far more quality films coming out in this supposed advanced age of technology. I get truly depressed each tim I look at the Rotten Tomatoes main page and see the list of splats on the side under Currently In Theaters. Why not complain about that? As a side point, Fight Club was a movie I think guilty of similar things you condemned Slumdog for, (brutality in slick shiny shrink wrap)and yet we both loved that film. You may understand my puzzlement over your negative judgement of Slumdog. My main point here is, however, not to convince you to like Slumdog, but to perhaps pursuade you to focus your complaints to more pressing and significant concerns in the current film industry.

Actually, there WAS a worse directed film this year than "Slumdog" (there were several, but one that is staring at an Oscar nom too).

That would be "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" - affirming once and for all that David Fincher is an overrated hack. One good movie (Fight Club) and SEVERAL horrible ones, capped off by this mess of a film.

"Slumdog" might not be the best directed film of the year, but at least it didn't suck.

JE: I had mixed reactions to "Benjamin Button" (never saw it a second time because, like "Synecdoche, NY," it felt unbearably long to me) -- but repeated viewings of "Zodiac" and "Fight Club" convince me he's no hack. Not like Danny Boyle who, to paraphrase Pauline Kael, thinks style is something to be crammed up the cracks in the plot.

E: I had mixed reactions to "Benjamin Button" (never saw it a second time because, like "Synecdoche, NY," it felt unbearably long to me) -- but repeated viewings of "Zodiac" and "Fight Club" convince me he's no hack. Not like Danny Boyle who, to paraphrase Pauline Kael, thinks style is something to be crammed up the cracks in the plot.

But Benjamin Button's plot was nearly a carbon copy of Forrest Gump. I would prefer style over no plot at all.

JE: To me, movies are all about style and only vaguely about plot. But I agree the screenplay is distractingly Gumpian.

Sorry, I forgot to add in my last post that "Fight Club" was a film that was hyper stylized as well, so I don't see how Boyle's stylization of Slumdog Millionaire is problematic. (I like "Fight Club" as well, by the way).

On channel thirteen of this morning. The two woman that were talking about the Oscars and the women's dresses. One of them said that Miley Cyrus is eighteen years old, she isn't eighteen years old, she is only sixteen.
Well, yea she does look two years older, but get the age right with the names.
Although she wants to look older because of all those clothes she has that makes her look older. Oh, and the makeup she wears, she looks like my older sister who is in her twenties, she should cut it down a little bit, maybe look more her age.

There’s been a tendency of late—especially since City of God--to glamorize poverty in the style of an MTV music video, with rapid editing, bright colors, and copious rim lighting. Slumdog Millionaire seems like the natural outcome of this trend, a movie so disingenuous it cannot but linger a moment on its mildly emotional climax before smash-cutting to a candy-colored Bollywood musical number. This film is an astonishingly tacky celebration of materialism masquerading as a serious consideration of childhood suffering in the slums of India. It turns the real-life hardship of millions into a shallow fairy-tale about a teenage boy named Jamal who wins 20 million rupees on Who Wants to Be a Millionaire because “it was written.”

No, we can’t even say that this is a film about rising out of poverty through plucky determination, because Jamal really doesn’t have to do anything; it was his destiny to become rich and have a hot girlfriend who looks like she could compete on the next season of Top Model.

So for all the millions of others still locked in squalor, sorry, I guess it just wasn’t “written” for you. Really, are we actually supposed to feel good about Jamal winning a TV game show when we saw a young boy have his eyes gouged out earlier in the film? When millions of other children are still trapped in child slavery, prostitution, and organized crime?

Beyond that, the film’s narrative structure is painfully predictable. The incessant flashbacks from the TV game show present to how certain events in Jamal’s life supplied him with the answers he would need to later win never create any genuine suspense about what’s going to happen, but rather just seem like director Danny Boyle’s crude hot-wiring of our emotions.