AR Rehman with Slumdog Millionaire crew
Image source Kevin Winter / Getty Images
Directors: Danny Boyle, Loveleen Tandan (codirector in India)
Music: A.R. Rehman
Lyrics: Gulzar
The Oscar night this year was all about Slumdog Millionaire, the story of a Mumbai lad who grows up in the slums surviving amidst crime and poverty and eventually winning millions to win his love back from the clutches of the mafia. The film beat the hot favorites like The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Milk and The Reader.
This British film with an Indian slums backdrop won 8 Academy awards for:
- Best picture
- Best director
- Best musical score
- Best song
- Best adapted screenplay
- Best film editing
- Best sound mixing
- Best cinematography
This was definitely a dream run for the entire team of Slumdog Millionaire that gathered on the stage upon receiving the best picture award.
For India of course the main attraction was A.R. Rehman who won an Oscar for the best musical score and the best song that he shared with the exceptionally talented lyricist Gulzar. Both A. R. Rehman and Gulzar are no strangers to fame and awards but the Oscar catapults them to the international stage where their talent is exposed in front of an international audience. If you go by the coverage of the Indian news channels the entire country is in a frenzy, it is almost like winning the Cricket World Cup.
Slumdog Millionaire has been at the receiving end of various criticisms too, for depicting the ugly underbelly of the country. A right-wing Hindu columnist even went so far as terming it as a anti-Hindu movie. Some Muslims protested that almost all Muslims in the film have been portrayed as gangsters. But all these protestations are being very conveniently laid to rest while the film earns kudos for almost every aspect of movie-making.
The film script was adapted from the Boeke Prize-winning and Commonwealth Writers’ Prize-nominated novel ‘Q & A’ written by Indian author and diplomat Vikas Swarup. The playback singer (for “Jai ho!”) for Slumdog Millionaire is Sukhvinder Singh
Slumdog Millionaire cast:
Dev Patel, Anil Kapoor, Saurabh Shukla, Rajendranath Zutshi, Jeneva Talwar, Freida Pinto, Irrfan Khan, Mahesh Manjrekar and various kids
