Slumdog Millionaire wins!

Hauling a total of eight awards, this movie about a slum dweller turned millionaire dominates this year’s Academy Awards. It took home the best Directing (Danny Boyle), Song (”Jai Ho”), Musical Score, Film Editing, Sound Mixing, Cinematography, Adapted Screenplay (Simon Beaufoy of “Full Monty”) and of course, Best Picture. That’s eight out of 10 nominations (including two nominations for best Song).

Directed by Danny Boyle and Loveleen Tandan (co-director in India), Slumdog Millionaire was shot in Mumbai. Adapted from a novel written by Vikas Swarup,  the movie juxtaposes reality and fantasy, pain and suffering with joy and love. Yes, it’s a love story but with a twist.

Slumdog Millionaire has been hauling awards from other award-giving bodies (including 7 awards from BAFTA and four from the Golden Globes), and has been anticipated as a big winner in this year’s Oscars.

If you haven’t watched the film, here’s a brief summary of the story from Fox Searchlight Pictures:

The story of Jamal Malik (Dev Patel), an 18 year-old orphan from the slums of Mumbai, who is about to experience the biggest day of his life. With the whole nation watching, he is just one question away from winning a staggering 20 million rupees on India’s “Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?” But when the show breaks for the night, police arrest him on suspicion of cheating; how could a street kid know so much? Desperate to prove his innocence, Jamal tells the story of his life in the slum where he and his brother grew up, of their adventures together on the road, of vicious encounters with local gangs, and of Latika (Freida Pinto), the girl he loved and lost. Each chapter of his story reveals the key to the answer to one of the game show’s questions. Each chapter of Jamal’s increasingly layered story reveals where he learned the answers to the show’s seemingly impossible quizzes. But one question remains a mystery: what is this young man with no apparent desire for riches really doing on the game show? When the new day dawns and Jamal returns to answer the final question, the Inspector and sixty million viewers are about to find out. At the heart of its storytelling lies the question of how anyone comes to know the things they know about life and love.

Here’s another interesting liveblog from the Oscars. Check it out.