Slumdog Millionaire

Magically Brutal.

Hopelessly romantic.

That alone should be enough of a rave review to get you in a theater to see Slumdog Millionaire, Danny Boyle's tour-de-force foray into the slums of Mumbai, India.

It is easily one of the best films of the year.

Let's be clear. I'm already generally predisposed to liking Boyle's films.

I did once track down a super-grainy, pirate VHS copy of Trainspotting from a shady hawker in Kuala Lumpur, not wanting to wait for a proper time to see the movie (technically, it was banned in Malaysia). It's been a perennial favorite of mine ever since.

So other than the hit zombie genre flick that I purposely missed (walking corpses, not my thing), my ears perk up when Boyle has something new up his sleeves. He's had his sandy misfires, but usually when his name is attached, you're in for a treat. It doesn't hurt that his last two movies, Millions and Sunshine were both small modern classics, in my mind.

But it's Trainspotting that I'm bouncing back to with Slumdog Millionaire. From overt nods -- think Ewan McGregor diving into that iconic toilet -- to underdog themes, this is Boyle heading back into a world of misfits who somehow have to find their way in a sometimes dank, depressing world. His hyper-stylized Mumbai fable is breathless and urgent, wrapped around the construct of simple game show, known the world over.

It is auspicious timing for a film gently steeped in the religious politics of modern India. As the camera lingered on the societal tensions defining the slumdog protagonists, the film unexpectedly provides a nuanced backdrop for the real-life terrorist attacks that brought Mumbai to a standstill recently.

A film could get lost in that subtext, but this is a much more subtle tale than that. Those themes are but the pillars that Boyle builds his story upon.

It is the tale of Jamal, an underdog who finds himself accused of cheating his way to the final question on the local version of Who Wants to be a Millionaire. In defending himself, Jamal crafts a story of tenacity and devotion to the few things he can hold dear in a lifetime of brutal turns. A child rising from absolutely nothing, this is a tale of hope, love and, above all, fate. In the end it seems plausibly inevitable that, of course, a child born to nothing would end up in contention for a "final answer" payoff.

Boyle doesn't go for the easy road here. The grins on our faces at the end of the movie were well earned. The odd triangle formed by Jamal, his industrious brother and the girl of his dreams have to earn their way to their ends. Every action has a real repercussion. There are no wasted scenes in the movie. Absolutely everything happens for a reason.

Beware if you're expecting a Hollywood romance, or even a Bollywood romance. At times the film is downright gritty, which I guess shouldn't be much of a surprise from a director steeped in zombie lore and heroin "chic." But that despair, thrown against the vivid canvas that only India can provide gives you reason to root for the underdog as the 20 million rupee question approaches.

By the time the inevitable nod to Bollywood hit the screen, it was a done deal. The entire theater was clapping and I had a satisfied grin on my face.

Danny Boyle has hit another one out of the park.

Sunshine in the Heart of Darkness

Sunshine is a visually transcendent film that will haunt me for a long to time to come. It is an affirmation of Danny Boyle as one of the top directors making movies today.

I had been looking forward to this movie last summer, but somehow managed to miss it in it's short art-house stay here in Denver.

If it doesn't involve zombies, I will always look out for a new Danny Boyle film. Sadly, Sunshine would have to wait until the DVD showed up.

It was worth the wait.

Hours later, despite the absolutely stunning visuals, I am touched by the surprisingly small movie Boyle has put together. It is a thoughtful and transcendent science fiction spectacle.

This story of a crew of astronauts racing towards our dying sun on a desperate final mission to save humanity in the end hinges on how drawn in you get into the individual characters.

In a way that other effects-laden apocalyptic thrillers rarely manage to do, Boyle invests you in the crew of the Icarus 2. As they face their fate daunting edge of searing solar heat and the frozen darkness of space, the movie focuses tightly on the seven individuals sent out on an impossible mission to save humanity

There are some weaker moments that might lose some people, especially as the film hurtles towards the end. At some points the movie stretches the grittier reality the movie goes to great lengths to establish earlier on.

Luckily I was already invested enough in the characters that I could overlook the momentary, if unfortunate, slips towards implausibility.

Much of that rests squarely on the shoulders of the brilliant Cillian Murphy. As a physicist carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders, he is the emotional center a movie like this requires. As you are forced to juggle enormous concepts of science, religion and humanity in your head, it is his character that subtly manages to keep the movie grounded in the personal claustrophobia of a desperate mission.

The visuals are stunning. The movie soars, managing to convey the loneliness of empty space and a blinding, dying sun in a relatable way. Boyle's outer space is unrelenting and tightly focused. He smartly forgoes any hint of the enormity of the universe, using his effects instead to brilliantly define the high stakes mission of the Icarus 2.

In the end it is a small movie with big effects. At it's core you have seven characters bound together by fate, destiny and responsibility. Boyle and his solid cast manage to create real stakes and real repercussions that bind them together.

Sunshine is an amazing movie, but it is not an easy ride. It forces you to make some leaps of faith in order to get to the very satisfying ending in the heart of darkness. The end result, though, is a confident film by a director who continues to engage me after all these years.

I look very much forward to seeing what Danny Boyle does next.