Slumdog Millionaire

I hate movies. I usually see about 10 movies a year, and of those maybe one is acceptable and another 1 is transcendent. The other 8 are garbage and make me want to gouge my own eyes out. Last night, I saw Slumdog Millionaire, and I loved it, except the last 10 minutes are kinda cheesy. As I was walking out of the theater, I realized why. It's because I didn't recognize ANYONE in the movie, and it was refreshing.

Why was it refreshing? Because the movie was about...the movie! It wasn't about the star, or the director, or some producer even. It was about the script. The words on the page carried the story, and the directing worked to complement that. The opposite of Slumdog is Valkyrie, which is Tom Cruise...not even attempting an accent, which really toads my wet sproket. It's self-serving, and instead of worrying about making a good movie, it became about marketing to the most people. News Flash: TOM CRUISE SHOULD NEVER BE IN A GERMAN WORLD WAR II MOVIE! And that is my diatribe about Hollywood movies. In my opinion, Hollywood movies are about actors and marketing, while the movies I like have either people you've never heard of, or Ellen Page pre-Juno.

About the movie, it was really excellent. There was action, adventure, love lost, excitement, feelings, thrills, and generally it functioned much like a hollywood film, not the "typical" independent movie. There were absolutely amazing effects, chase scenes that would have felt perfectly at home in a much larger film, and a generally enjoyable story arch, which is more than I can say for Get Smart, X Files, etc. It would make Blake Snyder and James Cameron proud. Most importantly, even though it took to December, it renewed my faith in making movies. If you haven't seen it yet, go!