AFTER wiping the floor with all competition at this year's Golden Globes, Danny Boyle's Slumdog Millionaire is already set to be a main contender for film of the year.

But what is it about this film that has critics raving and audiences willing to part with their cash in these dark and depressing times?

The concept behind Slumdog Millionaire is a clever one.

The film uses the globally significant game show Who wants to be a Millionaire? to tell the story of Jamal Malik (Dev Patel), a young man whose whole life has led him to know the answer to every single question.

Believing that a slumdog could neither be honest, or indeed clever enough to know the answers, the police question Jamal believing him to be a cheat.

The majority of the film is portrayed through a series of flashbacks of Jamal's life explaining the reason behind every answer. Many of these sequences are unpleasant, yet there is clearly a deep affection for the slum community and Indian culture that borders on nostalgic.

The vivid palette of these scenes provide a stark contrast to the scenes in the police station and the television studio.

This is perhaps consequential of Danny Boyle's authentic approach (one third of the film is in Hindi) along with his decision to co-direct parts of the film shot in India with Loveleen Tandan.

Along with the excellent direction, Dev Patel in the lead role holds his own remaining suitably deadpan during his grilling both in the hot seat of the television studio and the police station.

The real stars of the film however are the child actors who play the three main character's younger counterparts, particularly the youngest Jamal (played by Ayush Mahesh Khedekar) and his elder brother Salim (Azharuddin Mohammed Ismail).

The promotion for Slumdog Millionaire would have you believe that it is the film's "feel-good" approach that keeps audiences hooked.

This would be understandable if you were to ignore the the first three quarters of the film which deal with issues of slum life, police cruelty, prostitution, child torture and enslavement but to name a few.

The vivid colour, excellent choice of music, and glimmers of comic brilliance (one particular scene involving a Bollywood star's autograph springs to mind) are what keep the audience committed to the otherwise unrelenting life story of the lead character Jamal Malik.

By Christiana Brockbank

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