Slumdog Continues...

Among other things, the little movie that could has taken over all things media and the blogosphere. I find a lot of these conversations to be immensely interesting, although I'm still puzzled by some of the reactions this movie has stirred. For the life of me, I really cannot understand why. It might be that I've seen one too many Bollywood movies already, but Slumdog Millionare was purely an entertainer for me, and it is with some hesitation that I feel people are reading too much into it.

Reactions to the movie are far more interesting than the movie itself. They reveal much about about the ways in which India has experienced change over the last decade, and consequently, continuous shifts in discourse about those changes. Much of that discourse sounds familiar and is unsurprising, while much of it begs the question as to why a film like this is the cause for so much debate when the problematic cinema that India produces, packaged prettily with its own exxagerations and stereotypes about Western and modern life, rarely result in any.

Two very interesting reads:

The New York Times: Taking the 'Slum' Out of Slumdog

And largely in response to that:
Slumdog: Ben Piven's Fulbright Research on Dharavi

Plus:
The New York Times: The Real Roots of the 'Slumdog' Protests