Racism In Slumdog Millionaire

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In the article, “A Million Dollar Exit From the Anarchic Slum-World: Slumdog Millionaire’s Hollow Idioms of Social Justice”, Mitu Sengupta responds to how the slums and its citizens are presented in the film Slumdog Millionaire by Danny Boyle. Sengupta describes the slums as run-down and then goes on to specifically address the poverty that exists in India. When writing about the portrayal of the slums, Sengupta states, “Slumdog depicts the ‘slum’ as a feral wasteland, a place of evil and decay that is devoid of order, productivity and compassion”(599). Sengupta uses imagery to illustrate to viewers the unsanitary conditions that the people of Mumbai experience on a daily basis. Viewers can picture the tattered slums and the surrounding streets …show more content…

Sengupta explains that Boyle’s film solely portrays the negative aspects of capitalism in Mumbai as well as the harsh reality that it’s citizens experience and live in. Sengupta conveys accurate points when describing life in the slums based on what we witness in Danny Boyle’s movie, Slumdog Millionaire. When talking about the slums and the streets of Mumbai, Sengupta is precise when explaining that the city is cluttered with waste and rubbish. In Slumdog Millionaire, there is a scene where Jamal, Salim, and the other children of Mumbai are running from police officers in which Boyle uses different camera angles to show different parts of the city. In this scene, all of the shots expose trash laying in the background behind the slums and in the rivers surrounding Mumbai. This scene was slightly exaggerated but was necessary to show the viewers the raw details of the environment in which the Indians live. In Sengupta 's second claim, she states how Boyle only captures poverty in one area and fails to represent the whole country; however, despite the fact that Slumdog Millionaire emphasises the poverty present in