Another day, another award for Slumdog Millionaire (The Washington, DC Area Film Critics Association, or WAFCA!, named it best picture.) That’s the way it goes now for the immensely likable rags-to-riches Mumbai film directed by Danny Boyle. The story of a street urchin (“slumdog”) who somehow winds up on the Indian edition of Who Wants to be a Millionaire (see the clip below), Slumdog is entertaining all the way through. Even its end credits are a delight, when the film nods to both Bollywood and Hollywood with a terrific musical sequence in the train station.
But here’s the problem for Slumdog, which is distributed by both Fox Searchlight and Warner Brothers: With all these awards, the movie is losing its surprise factor. Hurry to the theater, kids — you’ve only got a week or so left to be the cool kid who “discovers” Slumdog. The movie is slowly going into wider release, and when you combine that with the award onslaught, well, you know what’s coming: It’s Backlash Time! I felt it myself this morning reading one of the many news stories that compares Slumdog’s Oscar run to those of Juno or Little Miss Sunshine — yawn. This is one of those moments where I wish there was less coverage of the Oscar race. Yes, that is absurd given that I edit a magazine that devotes a wee bit of space to the Oscars. But I wish I’d had at least a week or so to enjoy the movie as a lovely surprise before I had to start comparing it to other flicks in the race.
How about you, PopWatchers — does the constant coverage of the Oscar race ruin films for you? Does it help you discover new movies? Do you just wish it would go away? Discuss…
By Rick Tetzeli
More Slumdog Millionaire:
Movie Spotlight: Slumdog Millionaire
Dave Karger’s Oscar blog: Slumdog’s Oscar chances
Karger on the DC Critics’ Awards
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Don’t worry, we can just wait patiently until there’s backlash on the backlash, and then it will be cool to like the movie again.
Do I like the system? No. But I’m starting to figure out who it works.
i love oscar coverage. it drives my family crazy because i’m pretty much an awards encyclopedia when discussing movies.
I find that the Oscar coverage helps me discover films I would have never seen or heard of. I don’t find it ruins my viewing experience. I also take the coverage with a grain of salt (just because a few critics say its good, doesn’t mean I’ll agree with them).
I definitely like the buzz from the festival circuit because that’s where I hear about interesting new things to check out. But I agree, the season buzz does kill some things. Last year, after all the Juno hype, I was disappointed when I finally watched it. But when I saw it a second time many months afterward I liked it a lot more.
No. What actually ruins it for me is when you tell me that it won’t be cool to see this film in two weeks because it will be too popular to be considered a hidden gem. God forbid the movie lose it’s hipster/indie street cred.
i’m thinking that ’slumdog’ – an exhilarating movie, by the way, and danny boyle should win an oscar sooner rather than later – might escape the usual backlash because of the touchy, tragic mumbai factor…
The film also suffers from a tiresome narrative mechanism, where Jamal is interrogated by local police in how he knew all the questions to each answer in the Indian version of “Who Want’s to Be a Millionaire”, hence the titled. As Jamal recounts to how he knows each question, we see numerous amount of vignettes that display just how Jamal knew every question from horrible events that unfolded in his childhood. The film bounces from the game show to flashbacks. The device is hokey, forced, and lazy.
Now to Boyle’s craft, which the film has a lot of outstanding compositions, and first-rate framing, however Boyle using an enormous amount of Dutch angles, which there are a lot of beauitully composed dutch angles in this, t hough feels out of place for a film that attempts at being uplifting and by any means doesn’t add anything to the movie. Other problems with the film lies in its poor characterization of its supporting characters and cast , they are entirely cardboard cut-outs.
Overall Slumdog Millionare is mediocre, forgettable, and over-rated. It will be celebrated right now, but will not bring any significance or relevance in years to come.
The film also suffers from a tiresome narrative mechanism, where Jamal is interrogated by local police in how he knew all the questions to each answer in the Indian version of “Who Want’s to Be a Millionaire”, hence the titled. As Jamal recounts to how he knows each question, we see numerous amount of vignettes that display just how Jamal knew every question from horrible events that unfolded in his childhood. The film bounces from the game show to flashbacks. The device is hokey, forced, and lazy.
Now to Boyle’s craft, which the film has a lot of outstanding compositions, and first-rate framing, however Boyle using an enormous amount of Dutch angles, which there are a lot of beauitully composed dutch angles in this, t hough feels out of place for a film that attempts at being uplifting and by any means doesn’t add anything to the movie. Other problems with the film lies in its poor characterization of its supporting characters and cast , they are entirely cardboard cut-outs.
Overall Slumdog Millionare is mediocre, forgettable, and over-rated. It will be celebrated right now, but will not bring any significance or relevance in years to come.
Don’t worry – the huge majority of the people still won’t have heard of this movie, and they’ll still give you that blank-faced stare when you tell them about it, just like any other good indie movie, and then you’ll have to discuss ‘Twilight’ or ‘4 Christmases’ just so that they won’t think you’re a snob.
I’m not sure there are many things more irritating that pop culture snobs. You know the people that like something until it becomes popular and then they can’t stand it. Either something is great or it’s not – popularity shouldn’t have anything to do with it. Get over yourself!
Truthfully, I wasn’t that impressed. I got a screener of it a few weeks ago and, though visually stunning, I felt underwhelmed and detached from the story altogether.
I think the film is overrated, I agreed with a lot of Owen’s sentiments in his review, and the praise is a little deafening, let’s be honest.
I saw it this weekend and found if laughably bad. The story is admittedly a fairly-tale and isn’t supposed to be rooted in plausibility, but when you take a popular game show and change the rules of the show to heighten said implausibility you lose me. It was an overall silly and uninteresting excursion.
I LOVE the Oscars, i hate all the talk. I try to keep my Oscar coverage to a minimum, especially between the nominations and the actual awards show. I hate all the endless segments about “What Will They Wear?” or “What are the hottest parties of the night”. I don’t take about any of that, I just want to find out who won and hear speeches that make me cry. The only coverage I’m interested in is trying to see as many of the movies nominated as I possibly can before the show so I can make my own opinion on who should win or not.
I loved it and not because I read about a month ago it was a contender for an oscar. I saw an ad for it and then saw that it was directed by Danny Boyle (Director of Trainspotting). That’s when I wanted to see it.
After seeing it, I think it should be considered for an oscar or five. It’s the perfect blend of eastern and western film styles. Really brilliant.
I think several on the comments on this board have already demonstrated that the Slumdog backlash has begun full force. And I think it definitely has to do with the fact that Slumdog is suddenly getting a lot of Oscar buzz, and is so popular.
Look, not everyone is going to like every movie, no matter how praised and beloved it is (for instance, plenty of people hate Citizen Kane and Casablanca). But I do think the detractors become more vocal when something they dislike gets tons of praise and attention. Which is fine, everyone has their own taste. But it is annoying when the detractors insult everyone else for liking the movie they hated, like the people who bash The Dark Knight and Slumdog. And that’s really the worst part of the whole negative Oscar season, for me. Can’t we all just politely express what films did and did not move us, without insulting all others who don’t agree?