We just got back from seeing Slumdog Millionaire tonight. I suspect I won’t need to say much, since by now you’ve all heard how good this movie is supposed to be. For the few of you that don’t know about the movie, it’s the story of a young man who comes out of the slums of Mumbai to win the Indian incarnation of Who Wants to be a Millionaire (called, by the way, Kaun Banega Crorepati). He goes on the show not for fame or fortune, but to impress the girl he is destined to be with. As he explains how a “slumdog” could know the answers, we see vignettes of his life at three different ages. Through this, we get to see a picture of poverty in India that’s more powerful and expressive than any I’ve seen in a long while.

Since you can get the basic reviews everywhere you look, and I suspect this film will be dissected in some detail as Oscar season gets closer, I’m going to skip the basics and focus on three things I took away from the film. It should go without saying that you should go see it as soon as you can. There are some things tough for young children to understand or even see, so I’m not sure I would take young kids. It is brutally violent in a few places.

As I mentioned, Slumdog shows a side of poverty and religious strife in India that’s not present in many films. I personally found it very, very hard to watch. I spent a long time during the film wondering why I was getting so upset during the flashbacks, bouncing between sort of silently fuming at the injustice of it all and being just saddened by it. Certainly, some of the things we see are worthy of both reactions. There is evil in the world, and few experience it the way the impoverished do.

As I was trying to puzzle it out with Heidi on the ride home, I kept coming back to the same place. Growing up in the U.S., I’m only surrounded by lots of Indian people when I’m around family or our religious circle. Both groups are largely self-selecting. They’re all like me, more or less, from a socioeconomic perspective. As a result, I’ve learned that I can probably identify with someone that simply looks Indian. In India, obviously, there’s no homogeneity of class and social background. The poverty there is nothing like anything I’ve experienced in my life. Yet, simply because they look like me, I have a lot of trouble with the disdain shown by the middle class & wealthier Indians toward the poor.

Heck, it’s one of the reasons I feel extraordinarily uncomfortable about going to India. I feel so completely out of place witnessing the class stratification there and the obvious privilege that comes with money. I know how I’m supposed to act but I simply… can’t. Indians shouldn’t treat other Indians with such disdain. I think the cognitive dissonance is essentially what upsets me. I don’t know how to describe it better. Hopefully that gives you an idea of what I mean.

The second observation is that I still think Dark Knight, which I recently re-watched, is more deserving of Best Picture honors than Slumdog. While I really think SM is a unique film and worthy of winning, it follows an arc that’s pretty typical (love as destiny). DK, on the other hand, took what could’ve been a predictable Batman/super hero arc and turned it into a reasonably complex look at morality under stress. The Joker is anarchy, and the performances are solid across the board. I know it’s hard to consider a super hero action flick for the top spot, but the fact that it’s an action movie makes it even more impressive to me. Either movie would be a worthy winner, but I’m leaning DK.

Finally, the Slumdog soundtrack is very, very good. A.R. Rahman did a good job with the original music, and M.I.A.’s contributions fit very well. O… Saya is particularly intriguing as a standalone track. The M.I.A. tracks stick out a little since they’re culturally more Western-sounding than Rahman’s work, but it’s hard to find too much fault in that. Even if you don’t pick up the rest of the album, I recommend getting O… Saya and the new remix of Paper Planes (it’s the second, longer version on the disc). Both will likely be in January’s mix.

Bottom line: go see it as soon as you can. You’ll enjoy it.