I weep. My heart breaks for the children of India. This film scouts through the slums of Mumbai and Bombay as two orphaned boys flee from terror to seek home, peace, safety, shelter, food, and family only to find slavery, torture, danger, and death. This journey grows them up, and tears them apart. I ache for these children, and the millions like them. Slumdogs. So few escape. Our hero is the moral brother, the Christ-like, the hopeful, the dreamer. He is Jamal. Jamal's story is told, ironically, through each individual question of the show Who Wants to be a Millionaire. Each answer reveals a piece of his mystery, of his heart, and of his pain. And his heart, we come to find out, belongs to a girl named Latika.
Dumas' Three Musketeers provides an interesting literary underlayer as the "dogs" become the heroes and three children become the freedom fighters of their own destinies. Poverty, pursuits, and passions forge the journeys of the musketeers who become sword wielding peace-keepers as well as for the children who fight for survival . As we follow our little musketeers through India, we meet Jamal's Aramis, called Latika. Dumas' wrote his 3rd musketeer, Aramis, as the true best friend of the three - the one who holds friendship in sacred high regard and who speaks the truth. It is foolish to believe that scriptwriters choose these parallels by mistake. I believe that filmmakers Danny Boyle and Loveleen Tandan, as well as writer Simon Beaufoy create a shocking visual venue for truth through this film by showing the real lives of dump-dwellers, impoverished youth, and corrupt and immoral society members. This film shows real life for many broken people in our broken world.
This film is precious. It speaks for the children who cannot. It lives for the children who have not. It fights for the children who will not. It is for me and for you now to speak, to live, and to fight.
