Featuring disturbing scenes of children rummaging through rubbish heaps and police turning a blind eye to racial killings, Slumdog Millionaire is a stinging critique of the social ills plaguing the Indian poor.
Directed by Danny Boyle of Trainspotting fame, the film is based on the suspenseful novel Q&A by Vikas Swarup.
The film's gritty images are so shocking that the film provoked complaints from the Indian government for tarnishing the country's image. It is the fairy-tale story of a former street urchin who wins a fortune on the Indian version of Who Wants to be A Millionaire?
It opens with a harrowing scene in which contestant Jamal Malik (Briton Dev Patel) is being tortured by police, who - believing that a 'slum dog' could never answer all the quiz questions - have accused him of cheating.
What follows is a series of snapshots from his past - as a kidnap victim, a fake tour guide and server of tea. The flashbacks reveal how it is Jamal knew all the answers.
The power of this film is somewhat diminished by a sappy subplot about his search for his long-lost childhood sweetheart Latika (Freida Pinto), which takes up quite a lot of screen time in the second half of the film.
