Jamal Malik

Plot

In 1992, five-year-old Jamal Malik, a resident of the Juhu slum in Mumbai, obtains Bollywood star Amitabh Bachchan's autograph after jumping into a cesspit; the crowds around Amitabh Bachchan are deterred by Jamal as he is covered head to toe in human feces. Jamal's elder brother Salim later sells the autograph. Their mother is killed during the Bombay riots. Having escaped the riots and taken shelter from the rain, the brothers meet Latika, a girl from their slum. Jamal suggests that she could be their "third musketeer", a reference to The Three Musketeers, a novel which the brothers learned about in school. The brothers refer to themselves as Athos and Porthos but cannot remember the third musketeer's name.

The trio are found by Maman—a gangster who trains street children to become beggars. After witnessing Maman blinding the children with hot oil to make them more effective beggars, Salim escapes with Jamal and Latika. The brothers board a moving train, but Latika cannot keep up. Salim grabs her hand but purposely lets go in revenge for a prank Latika had pulled the night before, leaving her to be recaptured by Maman. For the next years, Salim and Jamal travel on top of trains, making a living by selling goods, pickpocketing, washing dishes, and pretending to be tour guides at the Taj Mahal. At Jamal's insistence, they return to Mumbai to find Latika and discover that Maman is raising her to be a prostitute. The brothers rescue her, with Salim shooting Maman dead. Impressed by this, Javed—a rival crime lord, grants Salim a job. In their room, Salim orders Jamal to leave him alone with Latika, presumably to sexually assault her. When Jamal refuses, Salim draws a gun on him, and Latika persuades Jamal to leave.

In 2004, Jamal, now working as a chaiwala in a call centre, learns that Salim is a high-ranking lieutenant in Javed's crime organisation. Jamal confronts Salim, who pleads for forgiveness. Jamal then sneaks into Javed's residence and reunites with Latika. Although he professes his love for her, she tells him to forget her. Despite the refusal, Jamal promises to wait for her every day at five o'clock at Victoria Terminus. Attempting to meet him there, Latika is captured by Javed's men, led by Salim. He scars her face while driving away. Jamal loses contact with Latika and in a final attempt to reach her, he becomes a contestant on Kaun Banega Crorepati, knowing that she watches the show.

Jamal plays well and becomes popular across India, much to the jealousy and dismay of the show's host, Prem Kumar. Kumar attempts to trick Jamal by feeding him the wrong answer to the penultimate question; however, Jamal answers correctly. When the episode ends, Jamal is arrested and tortured by police Kumar had subsequently called over, who suspect him of cheating. The police inspector eventually believes Jamal's explanations of how he knew each answer, and allows him to return to the show. Latika sees that Jamal was arrested on the news. Feeling guilty about his past behaviour, Salim gives Latika his phone and car keys, asking her to forgive him. After Latika leaves, Salim fills a bathtub with money and sits in it, waiting for Javed to realise what happened.

Production

Screenwriter Simon Beaufoy wrote Slumdog Millionaire based on the Boeke Prize-winning and Commonwealth Writers' Prize-nominated novel Q & A by Vikas Swarup. To hone the script, Beaufoy made three research trips to India and interviewed street children, finding himself impressed with their attitudes. The screenwriter said of his goal for the script: "I wanted to get (across) the sense of this huge amount of fun, laughter, chat, and sense of community that is in these slums. What you pick up on is this mass of energy."

By the summer of 2006, British production companies Celador Films and Film4 Productions invited director Danny Boyle to read the script of Slumdog Millionaire. Boyle hesitated, since he was not interested in making a film about Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?, which was produced by Celador. Then Boyle learned that the screenwriter was Beaufoy, who had written The Full Monty (1997), one of the director's favourite British films, and decided to revisit the script. Boyle was impressed by how Beaufoy wove the multiple storylines from Swarup's book into one narrative, and the director decided to commit to the project. The film was projected to cost $15 million, so Celador sought a US film distributor to share costs. Warner Independent Pictures gave $5 million and got the rights to the film.

Gail Stevens came on board to oversee casting globally. Stevens had worked with Boyle throughout his career and was well known for discovering new talent. Meredith Tucker was appointed to cast out of the US. The filmmakers then travelled to Mumbai in September 2007 with a partial crew and began hiring local cast and crew for production in Karjat. Originally appointed as one of the five casting directors in India, Loveleen Tandan has stated, "I suggested to Danny and Simon Beaufoy, the writer of Slumdog, that it was important to do some of it in Hindi to bring the film alive [...] They asked me to pen the Hindi dialogues which I, of course, instantly agreed to do. And as we drew closer to the shoot date, Danny asked me to step in as the co-director." Boyle then decided to translate nearly a third of the film's English dialogue into Hindi. The director fibbed to Warner Independent's president that he wanted 10% of the dialogue in Hindi, and she approved the change. Riz Ahmed auditioned for the role of Salim Malik. Filming locations included shooting in Mumbai's megaslum and in shantytown parts of Juhu, so film-makers controlled the crowds by befriending onlookers. Filming began on 5 November 2007.

In addition to Swarup's original novel Q & A, the film was also inspired by Indian cinema. Tandan has referred to Slumdog Millionaire as a homage to Hindi cinema, noting that "Simon Beaufoy studied Salim–Javed's kind of cinema minutely." Boyle has cited the influence of several Bollywood films set in Mumbai.[i] Deewaar (1975), which Boyle described as being "absolutely key to Indian cinema", is a crime film written by Salim-Javed based on the Bombay gangster Haji Mastan, portrayed by Bollywood superstar Amitabh Bachchan, whose autograph Jamal seeks at the beginning of Slumdog Millionaire. Anil Kapoor noted that some scenes of the film "are like Deewaar, the story of two brothers of whom one is completely after money while the younger one is honest and not interested in money." Slumdog Millionaire has a similar narrative structure to Deewaar. Satya (1998), written by Saurabh Shukla (who plays Constable Srinivas in Slumdog Millionaire), and Company (2002), based on the D-Company, both offered "slick, often mesmerising portrayals of the Mumbai underworld" and displayed realistic "brutality and urban violence." Boyle has also stated that the chase in one of the opening scenes of Slumdog Millionaire was based on a "12-minute police chase through the crowded Dharavi slum" in Black Friday (2007), adapted from Hussein Zaidi's book of the same name about the 1993 Bombay bombings.

Soundtrack

The Slumdog Millionaire soundtrack was composed by A. R. Rahman, who planned the score for over two months and completed it in two weeks. Danny Boyle has said that he chose Rahman because "not only does he draw on Indian classical music, but he's got R&B and hip hop coming in from America, house music coming in from Europe and this incredible fusion is created." Rahman won the 2009 Golden Globe Award for Best Original Score and won two Academy Awards, one for Best Original Score and one for Best Original Song for "Jai Ho". Rahman had two songs nominated for Best Original Song – the nomination for "O... Saya" was shared with M.I.A., while the win for "Jai Ho" was shared with lyricist Gulzar. The soundtrack was released on M.I.A.'s record label N.E.E.T. On Radio Sargam, film critic Goher Iqbal Punn termed the soundtrack Rahman's "magnum opus" which will acquaint "the entire world" with his artistry.

Release

Theatrical

In August 2007, Warner Independent Pictures acquired the U.S. and Canadian rights and Pathé the international rights to distribute Slumdog Millionaire theatrically with a release date of November 7, 2008. However, in May 2008, Warner Independent Pictures was announced to be shutting down, with all of its remaining projects being transferred to Warner Bros. Pictures, its parent studio.[iv] Warner Bros. Pictures doubted the commercial prospects of Slumdog Millionaire and suggested that it would go direct to video without a U.S. theatrical release under the Warner Premiere label. In August 2008, the studio began searching for buyers for various productions, to relieve its overload of end-of-the-year films. Halfway through the month, Warner Bros. Pictures entered into a pact with Fox Searchlight Pictures to share distribution of the film, with Fox Searchlight buying 50% of Warner Bros.'s interest in the film and handling US distribution.

Home media

The film was released on DVD and Blu-ray in the United States on 31 March 2009. It opened at No. 2 in the DVD sales chart, making $14.16m from 842,000 DVD units. As of 12 November 2009, an estimated 1,964,962 DVD units have been sold, for $31.32m in revenue. This figure does not include Blu-ray sales/DVD rentals. It had previously been announced that 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment would be starting a new marketing program with two versions of each release: a stripped-down minimal version for the rental market, and a traditional full version with "bonus extra" features, such as commentary and "making of" material, for the retail market. The release production was mixed up; some full versions were shipped in rental cases, and some retail versions were missing the extras despite their being listed on the box. Public apologies were issued by Fox and Amazon.

In the United Kingdom, the film was released on DVD and Blu-ray on 1 June 2009. It was 2009's fifth best-selling film on home video retail in the United Kingdom, third best-selling British film, and overall best-selling British independent film in the UK. It was also the year's top online video rental in the UK. On UK television, it was watched by 5.2 million viewers on Channel 4 in 2010, making it the year's fifth most-watched film on UK television, the fourth most-watched British film, and the year's most-watched Channel 4 film.

Reception

Box office

Following its success at the 81st Academy Awards, the film topped the worldwide box office (barring North America), grossing $16 million from 34 markets in the week following the Academy Awards. Worldwide, it has grossed $378 million, becoming Fox Searchlight Pictures's highest-grossing film ever (surpassing Juno). It was the year's second highest-grossing British film worldwide (below Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince) and the most successful British independent film of all time.

Slumdog Millionaire was first shown at the Telluride Film Festival on 30 August 2008, where it was positively received, generating "strong buzz". It also screened at the Toronto International Film Festival on 7 September 2008, where it was the festival's "first widely acknowledged popular success", winning the People's Choice Award. It debuted with a limited North American release on 12 November 2008, followed by a nationwide US release on 23 January 2009.

After debuting on a Wednesday, the film grossed $360,018 in 10 theatres in its first weekend, a strong average of $36,002 per theatre. In its second weekend, it expanded to 32 theatres and made $947,795, or an average of $29,619 per theatre, representing a drop of only 18%. In the 10 original theatres of its release, viewership went up 16%, and this is attributed to strong word-of-mouth. The film expanded into wide release on 25 December 2008 at 614 theatres and earned $5,647,007 over the extended Christmas weekend. Following its success at the 81st Academy Awards, the film's earnings increased by 43%, the most for any film since Titanic. In the weekend of 27 February to 1 March, it reached its widest release at 2,943 theatres. It has grossed over $140 million at the North American box office.

The film was released in the United Kingdom on 9 January 2009, and opened at #2 at the UK box office. It reached #1 in its second weekend and set a UK box office record, as the film's earnings increased by 47%, the "biggest ever increase for a UK saturation release," breaking "the record previously held by Billy Elliot's 13%". This record-breaking "ticket surge" in the second weekend came after Slumdog Millionaire won four Golden Globes and received eleven BAFTA nominations. It grossed £6.1 million in its first eleven days in the UK. Its earnings increased by another 7% the following weekend, bringing its total gross up to £10.24 million for its first 17 days in the UK, and up to £14.2 million in its third week.

Critical reception

Outside of India, Slumdog Millionaire was met with critical acclaim. The film holds a 91% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 290 reviews, with an average score of 8.4/10. The consensus reads, "Visually dazzling and emotionally resonant, Slumdog Millionaire is a film that's both entertaining and powerful." On Metacritic, the film has an average score of 86 out of 100, based on 36 reviews, indicating "universal acclaim". Movie City News shows that the film appeared in 123 different top ten lists, out of 286 different critics lists surveyed, the 4th most mentions on a top ten list of any film released in 2008.

Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film four out of four stars, calling it "a breathless, exciting story, heartbreaking and exhilarating." Wall Street Journal critic Joe Morgenstern refers to Slumdog Millionaire as, "the film world's first globalised masterpiece." Ann Hornaday of The Washington Post argues that, "this modern-day 'rags-to-rajah' fable won the audience award at the Toronto International Film Festival earlier this year, and it's easy to see why. With its timely setting of a swiftly globalising India and, more specifically, the country's own version of the Who Wants to Be a Millionaire TV show, combined with timeless melodrama and a hardworking orphan who withstands all manner of setbacks, Slumdog Millionaire plays like Charles Dickens for the 21st century." Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times describes the film as "a Hollywood-style romantic melodrama that delivers major studio satisfactions in an ultra-modern way" and "a story of star-crossed romance that the original Warner brothers would have embraced, shamelessly pulling out stops that you wouldn't think anyone would have the nerve to attempt any more."

Anthony Lane of the New Yorker stated, "There is a mismatch here. Boyle and his team, headed by the director of photography, Anthony Dod Mantle, clearly believe that a city like Mumbai, with its shifting skyline and a population of more than fifteen million, is as ripe for storytelling as Dickens's London [...] At the same time, the story they chose is sheer fantasy, not in its glancing details but in its emotional momentum. How else could Boyle get away with assembling his cast for a Bollywood dance number, at a railroad station, over the closing credits? You can either chide the film, at this point, for relinquishing any claim to realism or you can go with the flow—surely the wiser choice." Colm Andrew of the Manx Independent was also full of praise, saying the film "successfully mixes hard-hitting drama with uplifting action and the Who Wants To Be a Millionaire show is an ideal device to revolve events around". Several other reviewers have described Slumdog Millionaire as a Bollywood-style "masala" movie, due to the way the film combines "familiar raw ingredients into a feverish masala" and culminates in "the romantic leads finding each other."

Reactions from India and the Indian diaspora

Slumdog Millionaire has been a subject of discussion among a variety of people in India and the Indian diaspora. Some film critics have responded positively to the film; others objected to issues such as Jamal's use of British English or the fact that similar films by Indian filmmakers have not received equal recognition. A few notable filmmakers such as Aamir Khan and Priyadarshan have been critical of the film. Author and critic Salman Rushdie argues that it has "a patently ridiculous conceit."

Adoor Gopalakrishnan, one of the most acclaimed film makers in India during the 1980s and 1990s and a five-time Best Director winner of the Indian National Film Awards, lambasted Slumdog Millionaire, calling it in an interview to NDTV: "A very anti-Indian film. All the bad elements of Bombay's commercial cinema are put together and in a very slick way. And it underlines and endorses what the West thinks about us. It is falsehood built upon falsehood. And at every turn is fabricated. At every turn it is built on falsehood. I was ashamed to see it was being appreciated widely in the west... Fortunately Indians are turning it down."

Academic criticism

The film has been subject to academic criticism. Mitu Sengupta (2009 and 2010) raises substantial doubts about both the realism of the film's portrayal of urban poverty in India and whether the film will assist those arguing for the poor. Rather, Sengupta argues the film's "reductive view" of such slums is likely to reinforce negative attitudes to those who live there. The film is therefore likely to support policies that have tended to further dispossess the slum dwellers in terms of material goods, power and dignity. The film, it is also suggested, celebrates characters and places that might be seen as symbolic of Western culture and models of development. Ana Cristina Mendes (2010) places Boyle's film in the context of the aestheticising and showcasing of poverty in India for artistic (and commercial) purposes, and proceeds to examine "the modes of circulation of these representations in the field of cultural production, as well as their role in enhancing the processes of ever-increasing consumption of India-related images."

However, there are others who point to the changing urban aspirations and prospects for mobility that can be seen in Indian cities such as Mumbai in which the film is set. The film is seen by D. Parthasarathy (2009) as reflecting a larger context of global cultural flows, which implicates issues of labour, status, ascription-achievement, and poverty in urban India. Parthasarathy (2009) argues for a better understanding of issues of dignity of labour and that the film should be interpreted in a more nuanced way as reflecting the role of market forces and India's new service economy in transforming the caste and status determined opportunity structure in urban India.

Academic criticism has also been extended to the underlying philosophy of the film, with its apparent ends-justify-means message. Many elements of the film, including the apparent redemption of Salim at the end of his life and the film's subjugation of the suffering of peripheral characters to the romantic aspirations of Jamal, are characteristic, say such critics, of a naïve, Providence-based vision of reality.

Musical adaptation

It was announced on November 1, 2024, that a musical adaptation of the film is in the works. The musical will be produced by Two-time Tony Award winner Ken Davenport, with music and lyrics by A.R. Rahman.

Accolades

Slumdog Millionaire was critically acclaimed and named in the top ten lists of various newspapers. On 22 February 2009, the film won eight out of ten Academy Awards for which it was nominated, including Best Picture and Best Director. It was the fifteenth film to win at least eight Academy Awards. It was the eleventh Best Picture Oscar winner without a single acting nomination, the last film to do so until Parasite in 2019. At the same time, Taare Zameen Par (Like Stars on Earth), India's submission for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film, failed to make the short list of nominations and was frequently compared with Slumdog Millionaire in the Indian media.

It was also the first film shot using digital cinematography to win the Academy Award for Best Cinematography, which was given to Anthony Dod Mantle. The film also won seven of the eleven BAFTA Awards for which it was nominated, including Best Film; all four of the Golden Globe Awards for which it was nominated, including Best Drama Film; and five of the six Critics' Choice Awards for which it was nominated. The title sequence was nominated at the 2009 Rushes Soho Shorts Film Festival in the Broadcast Design Award category in competition with the Match of the Day Euro 2008 titles by Aardman and two projects by Agenda Collective.

In 2010, the Independent Film & Television Alliance selected the film as one of the 30 Most Significant Independent Films of the last 30 years. In 2021, members of Writers Guild of America West (WGAW) and Writers Guild of America, East (WGAE) ranked its screenplay 38th in WGA’s 101 Greatest Screenplays of the 21st Century (So Far).

In 2025, it was one of the films voted for the "Readers' Choice" edition of The New York Times' list of "The 100 Best Movies of the 21st Century," finishing at number 163.