Danny Boyle ventures in to yet another genre to show everyone how it's done. Slumdog Millionaire is his shot at a Bollywood love story. The same masterful film making that he showed in his prior modern classics like Trainspotting, Sunshine and 28 Days Later shows up again as Boyle proves he can produce unique and compelling stories in any genre.

The story of a young man from the slums of Mumbai, India and his struggle to prove he is not a cheat at the country's favorite game show (Who Wants to be a Millionaire) while he explains his back story of love and loss and coming from nothing and less.

Boyle unfurls the story slowly enough that it's not immediately obvious where he's going, so it keeps the audience involved so well that you stay wrapped up in it through some mildly slow spots in the the movie. The pace moves quickly enough through the rest of the film that those slow spots are evened out.

Visually explosive sequences and frenetic pacing balances with vast landscapes of Mumbai and serene moments of introspection as the characters grow up in some chaotic conditions but somehow manage to pull through.

The balancing act continues with perfect highs and wretched lows within each of the flashbacks and modern stories.

Hopefully the next Boyle film will live up.

Slumdog Millionaire gets an A-.
--John Berry, Online Editor--