Is it really a moment to celebrate for us Indians? Slumdog won 8 Oscars. Yes.
Two of them were for an Indian. Agreed.
But are we dumb enough not to see that the entire process of rewarding Slumdog was the West's way of ridiculing India's Nouveau riche status. In a Globalised world where the only victories worth winning are those of the mind, the West has pulled off a coup de grace.
Call me a pessimist. Call me 'apatriotic'. But I desist from finding joy in this victory. My heart celebrates Rahman's success with all the gusto of a true Indian. Then again, does Jai ho even come close to expressing the maestro's true potential. This is the guy who gave us Roja, Saathiya, Jaane tu ya Jaane na. Agreed that most of these songs were no-brainers(lyrics-wise), but that does not in the least bit diminish his musical genius. Surely no Indian will look back and say Jai ho was Rahman's magnum opus. What the hell, we won't even remember the song in a year or two.
Coming back to the point why I call the movie an 'ideologically imperialistic' one. For one, there may be a million movies showing the west in a poor light but show me a movie made by a foreigner which shows India in a positive light. Not many, huh. Even if there is such a thing, westerners wouldn't like to concede that a third world country could be in any way superior.
Wait a second, you might cite Richard Attenborough's Gandhi as a contradiction, but then again a foreigner had to show the world who Gandhi was. And to this day, Gandhi doesn't have a Nobel peace prize. Not that it makes any difference to a man of his stature but look at the paradox.
All in all, it's a victory for the western world's blighted view of India. It's their way of showing us that we are just slumdogs who got lucky. Still don't believe me, watch Steven Spielberg's 'Indiana Jones and the temple of doom'. You will understand the level of apartheid still in vogue!!!
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3 Comments:
>What's your say on what I wrote?
>..it's really well written...i wrote back only after reading it...what points i try to make here is that we should see and observe things better than ordinary ppl outside...we have studied things, have known, have read things better but still we get manipulated so easily...slumdog is good but not that a great movie the way it's portrayed...i'm a movie buff...i've seen them all..i'm a oscar encyclopedia, will tell ne1 about movies, it's actors, directors trivia, mostly just like that...but these ppl don'tunderstand..Indian consumers u know :)
> that's why i gave example of Roadies..most of them are fan..but what they have got, observed from that...nothing...silent viewers still what we r...after studying MBA, marketing...it's not good
Spammed on IP by Shubhesh-My Senior
It's indeed ridiculous that SM has won 8 Oscars. It made me crouch with embarrassment than howl with ecstasy. It's only shown the West's disguised contempt for India or, at best, it can be looked at as a strategic step to enlist India in US's cause in various international issues.
OK,these foreigners have a very condescending attitude about India, that burns me up. Remember Mother Theresa, she had to come and hold a black Indian child in her arms and she won a Nobel Peace Prize, for Gods sake ! Did she not find any slums in her native Albania? As for Rehman's music, it is mediocre, in this movie "Slumdog", so also is his Vande Mataram. But his music in tamil and telugu movies is really fantastiac, and it is for this that I admire Rehman, and not for Slumdogs.
Posted by Dr.Venkatraman
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