Below are extracts from interviews with Danny Boyle (Director) and Simon Beaufoy (Writer). They discuss how they deal with the images that might already exist for UK audiences in particular about India, and how Slumdog Millionaire offers something different to both UK and Indian audiences.
'Well I think audiences are going to see India as they don't really relate to it. I think a lot of us particularly in Britain when the word India or Deli or Bombay is mentioned have still, despite how long ago it was, a slightly Raj like association in our heads. Of something rather noble or slightly old fashioned. I think that's our default position when someone mentions India. And what I'd really…what I really love about the film is it gives you what India really is now. It is rapaciously industrialising, everyone is on the mobile, traffic jams everywhere, smog, tower blocks going up like never before and that's modern India. And I don't think anyone's seen that on screen in Britain.'
'It's interesting the Indian films tend not to shoot on the streets because its so chaotic and you can get so little done, and also because the stars in their movies of course attract unbelievable crowds. So they tend to film inside studios so you get this... You can see where the film culture has been built out of because its all big stars and they tend to shoot in studios now. They tend to be studio kind of pictures that don't reflect life. And they find, people who have seen our film find our film quite shocking. You know that it's so truthful you know about what the city is like. You know they find that really shocking to see that in a movie they don't expect that in a movie.'
