Slumdog Millionaire

Went to see this last night. Very well done, very good movie. Got me to thinking about two things. One is how useful hope is when it is completely unrealistic. Vast swathes of people will get behind those who go from obscurity to fame and/or fortune overnight because they see themselves in those people, and it helps them have hope of a better life. Now, most people who end up rising out of slums and horrible lives do so out of a combination of hard work, intelligence/savvy, and luck. Plenty of people who combine those things don't have quite enough of the luck or whichever to make it out anyway. Granted, winning some game shows takes a bit of hard work and intelligence/savvy, although not all, but still the chances of that happening for any individual have got to be astronomically low. It's kind of like inner-city youths hoping to make the NBA - sure, it's a worthwhile dream, but it's so unlikely that it's almost counter-productive, unless the coaches are able to translate some of that hard work into other areas. So, I guess what bothers me is setting these unrealistic hopes for people that might make them sit and hope for salvation rather than have any faith in their ability to rise out on their own and concentrate their efforts there.

Furthermore, I think it's a way that people can get really dissatisfied with the lives they have. "Oh, I'm making enough to get by, and I've got this great family, but that guy's got this incredibly romantic story and is a millionaire! Why can't I have that?" Well, the vast majority of people can't have that - especially both parts. Romantic movies with their ridiculous happy endings have this effect on people all the time - David Sedaris talked about going to see The End of the Affair with his longtime partner and how it had that effect in his book Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim. It's so true - it leaves people thinking that love is easy and fated and just around the corner, and super romantic and happy all the time - and makes them wonder why their pedestrian relationship isn't the same way.

The other thing that it made me think about was the extent to which Western cultural chauvinism will impact the success of this movie. I had a couple of different classes this last semester that talked about the effect that has on feminism and on human rights movements. We have a tendency to assume that we have reached the pinnacle of both women's rights and human rights, and to assume that the way we view and value treatment of women and people generally is the best way to do so. As a result, when we see things that are done wrong in other countries, we shake our heads and think we need to help them - according to Leti Volpp, we often do so while ignoring the similar problems that still exist in America. I don't know that I buy that things are as bad for women in America as they are in every other country in the world, but I do think it's interesting to note just how easy it is to accept the depictions of some of the horrible things that go on in the movie, maybe partly because we're seeing them happen in India. Our country has its share of horrors, too, but I'm inclined to think that if the movie was set here or in any other Western country (made by British filmmakers), then it would be harder for many Western viewers to take the extent of the misery and abuse depicted in Slumdog Millionaire at face value.

All in all, a great movie - but I'll still pick Milk over it.