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This movie took me to film heaven. It was everything I could have asked for in a movie. Here's why.
I'm a sucker for the rags to riches story, especially when it avoids being cliche and is as authentic as this one. To see the reality of poverty, religious conflict and the social factors that can determine whether one survives or dies, is powerful.
There's one scene in the movie when Jamal encounters his childhood friend, the blind singer, and he says to Jamal, "I was not as lucky as you." Luck. It is the hope of those in situations like the ones Jamal and Salim are in. Their hope for a better life does not lie in rule of law, democracy or education. It lies in luck. And Jamal was lucky. He was lucky that the questions that were asked of him coincided with his experience. He was lucky that he and his brother were able to escape the children's camp they were confined in. Chance.
So does chance and luck determine our fate to the same degree that it might determine the fate of those in the developing world? Perhaps. But perhaps the risk is more acute for them because they do not have other institutions or privileges to rely on.
But there's another aspect to this movie, "It is written." And it brings me back to the idea of a telos, of our purpose--a telos that is pre-determined by something above ourselves.... Something that we cannot necessarily control. I'm not advocating for Calvinism in any way here, but I am saying that we do not control our purpose. We may control the extent to which we fulfill this purpose. We may control our choices, but the greater purpose for which we are here and the contributions to the world we are supposed to make are probably designed by something larger than us.
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