Millionaire Slumdogs
The movie Slumdog Millionaire released and as expected by many, walked away with honors at the Golden Globes and is likely to do as well at the Baftas and the Oscars. Suddenly out of nowhere came Amitabh Bachchan and slammed the movie for projecting India as Third World dirty underbelly developing nation and causing pain and disgust among nationalists and patriots. Strong words indeed, coming from a megastar and the doyen of Indian commercial cinema. Amidst uproar from all quarters Amitabh Bachchan denied his statement and claimed that he was misrepresented. He need not have done that. What Amitabh said was right. It is a fact that the movie presents India in a poor light. Maybe his timing was wrong, but then, he was never a good politician, as history tells us. The slumdog phenomenon started a long time back with the Indian authors making it a success mantra. Dominique Lapierre started the phenomenon with A City of Joy. The book was a hit and so was the film. The smarter and the more ...