What Went Right: Slumdog Millionaire
By Shalimar Shahota
December 2, 2013
BoxOfficeProphets.com
Eighteen-year-old Jamal Malik (Dev Patel) from Mumbai has miraculously managed to make his way as a contestant on India’s Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? He’s just one question away from winning the top prize, but before he can answer it the show runs out of time… and Jamal is suddenly arrested by the police. He is suspected of cheating, because, “What can a slumdog possibly know?” Jamal then tells the police the story of his life up to this point, how he, his brother Salim and fellow street child Latika made it from the slums, and how certain moments led to Jamal knowing the answers.
Slumdog Millionaire is essentially a rags to riches story, a modern day fairy tale, the modern part being that Jamal accumulates his riches by taking part in a game show. Being a fairy tale means that the audience has to accept (or at least go along with) a few impossible scenarios.
Slumdog Millionaire was backed by Celador (the UK production company behind the original Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? TV series), Film4 and Pathé. Tessa Ross of Film4 (the film’s executive producer) optioned the film rights in Vikas Swarup’s novel Q&A, approaching Simon Beaufoy to pen the script. Director Danny Boyle read it and knew within the first 20 pages that he was going to direct it. The film had a production budget of $15 million, with Warner Independent Pictures agreeing to distribute it in the US.
During shooting, Loveleen Tandan was initially involved as a casting director, but eventually became credited as a co-director. It was she who suggested that parts of the film had to be in Hindi rather than completely in English. It was a move that also helped draw in a wider Indian audience.
In May 2008, the film was in post-production when Boyle was given the news that Warner Independent Pictures would be closing. “Warners weren’t going to distribute it because they closed Warner Independent,” said Boyle to Empire magazine. “We didn’t have a North American distributor.” The film was set up at Warner Bros., who suggested releasing the film straight-to-DVD. They then told Boyle that alternatively he could pick another distributor to sell the film to. In stepped Fox Searchlight, who originally expressed interest, and agreed to market and distribute the film in the US. Said Fox Searchlight President Peter Rice, “The film is tour de force of filmmaking that hits you both viscerally and emotionally at every twist and turn. Everyone here was just astonished by the movie and immediately knew we had to be involved with it. Searchlight is pleased to able to work with Warner Bros. on such a unique and extraordinary film.”
From the outset, this certainly didn’t look like a worldwide hit. Looking at the cast list, the only big names would be Anil Kapoor and Irrfan Kahn, two names that would still prompt the majority of western audiences to say, “Who?” In particular, the film’s leads Dev Patel and Freida Pinto had never acted in a feature film before. Most of the film’s posters are pretty awful. The US one sheet looks like florescent vomit. The UK poster features the grown up Jamal and Latika smiling amid a rain of confetti, with a quote from the then News of the World critic Robbie Collin included, calling it “The feel-good film of the decade.” Boyle himself was not particularly happy with this marketing slant, saying, “You can’t go in expecting it to be Mamma Mia!” The trailer, however, with A R Rahman’s Latika’s Theme playing over the opening, cleverly highlights the fairy tale aspect of what audiences might be in for.
Slumdog Millionaire had its world premiere at the Telluride Film Festival on August 30, 2008, and subsequently played at the Toronto, Austin, Chicago and London Film Festivals over the following months (it won the People’s Choice Award at the Toronto Film Festival). This is where the strong word of mouth began, as the film started generating a lot of buzz, positive early reviews and some talk about Oscar.
Slumdog Millionaire opened in limited release in the US at just 10 theaters on Wednesday, November 12, 2008. It earned $427,715 over its opening five days and ranked at #24 for the weekend. In the second week Fox expanded the film to 32 venues. It earned $947,795 and jumped up to #11. Word-of-mouth coupled with positive reviews was clearly working. Fox slowly expanded the film to more cities each week and its weekend gross continued to climb. During the film’s sixth week of release, it finally crept into the top ten, landing at #8 with a weekend take of $3 million. It had earned a total of $12 million at this point.
On Sunday, January 11, 2009, the film won four Golden Globe awards. On the strength of this, the following weekend (its tenth week of release) the film charted at #10 with a weekend gross of $5.8 million. On Thursday January 22, 2009, the 81st Academy Award nominations were announced, with Slumdog Millionaire receiving ten nominations. Fox capitalized on this and the following day expanded the film into over 1,400 theaters. The film earned $10.6 million in its 11th week of release, charting at #5.
On Sunday, February 22, 2009, the film dominated at the Academy Awards and won eight Oscars, including Best Picture, Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay. Two days later on February 24th and the film crossed the $100 million mark on its 105th day of release. The weekend after its success at the Academy Awards, the film was playing at over 2,900 theaters and achieved its highest chart position and weekend gross, landing at #3 with a take of $12 million.
Slumdog Millionaire ran for 28 weeks (12 of which were in the US top ten) and earned $141.31 million at the US box office. It became one of Fox Searchlight’s highest grossing films, while for Fox it was one their highest grossing films of 2008 in the US, surpassing the likes of 27 Dresses, Jumper and What Happens in Vegas. With $236.59 million earned overseas ($52 million from the UK alone), Slumdog Millionaire had managed to earn a total of $377.9 worldwide. It is Danny Boyle’s highest grossing film to date.
On the run up to its release, during, and even after, Slumdog Millionaire was making headlines. Interestingly, not all of the stories were positive; some were controversial. Yet it still got people talking to the point where those who hadn’t seen the film simply had to go and see it, just so they could be included in the conversation. One of the most notable situations involved India’s megastar Amitabh Bachchan. In January 2009, a few weeks before the film was released in India, he decided to highlight two comments about it that were mentioned on his blog. One mentioned how “Slumdog Millionaire projects India as Third World dirty under belly developing nation.” Unfortunately, the media took this out of context and assumed that he was the one saying this, even though he had not actually seen the film at that point. A few weeks later, Bachchan viewed the film when it opened and described it as “Wonderful.”
There were also stories about the child stars featured in the film, how much they were paid and their living conditions. Along with this was the “poverty porn” aspect. In January 2009, following the film’s release in India, the LA Times published an article titled “Indians Don’t Feel Good About Slumdog Millionaire.” The article quoted film professor Shyamal Sengupta, who called the film “a white man’s imagined India.” Responding to the whole “poverty porn” criticism, Boyle declared that he wanted audiences to take from the film the “breathtaking resilience of people and the joy of people despite their circumstances - that lust for life. What we tried to do in the film was include as much of the city [of Mumbai] as possible.”
Using the game show Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? as the backdrop for the film was a major factor. By the time Slumdog Millionaire was released, the show had been licensed to over 100 countries. Millions around the world had seen and enjoyed Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?, its simple format being a single contestant answering questions to win a cash prize. While Slumdog Millionaire is not necessarily about Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?, using a real game show that has been widely viewed around the world certainly made the film more accessible.
Vikas Swarup, the author of the novel Q&A, upon which the film is based, revealed in an interview with The Guardian that changes were made, but they appeared to make for a better film. “Danny thought the hero should be arrested on suspicion of cheating on the penultimate question, not after he wins as I had it,” said Swarup. “That was a successful idea.” As well as dropping a few sub-plots, the film turned the two friends into brothers, and a name change saw Ram Mohammad Thomas became Jamal Malik. “It’s more dramatically focused as a result, perhaps more politically correct,” said Swarup on changing his main character’s unusual name, which combined three religions. “I was forewarned of the changes by Simon Beaufoy, the screenwriter.” Overall, Swarup had praise for the end result. “The film is beautiful. The plot is riveting. The child actors are breathtaking.”
A British film that’s set in India, which ultimately received a significant push from an American distributor and countless awards; with Who Want to Be a Millionaire? at the centre of it, Slumdog Millionaire had immense global appeal. It was also an underdog story in both senses, given what’s played out on screen and how it became one of those rare instances of a film climbing up the charts. In the process it achieved praise, accolades, controversy and immense box office returns, offering plenty to talk about. One of the defining factors at work was the strong word-of-mouth, with the film’s considerable quality eventually highlighted by its four Golden Globe Awards, seven BAFTA’s and eight Oscars. And it is a feel good story, an unusual one, given that it involves torture, shootings, riots and fights. When interviewed by Empire magazine, Boyle said, “I think one of the reasons the film seems to work for people is that it is very extreme…You’ve got to portray it as an extreme experience.” Because anyone that jumps through shit, becomes an orphan and escapes from gangsters deserves to be rewarded… and audiences like a happy ending.