Cong Nguyen Mr.

. Matthews To what extent do the two texts you have studied this year explain similar themes in different ways? 1000 words. Slumdog Millionaire and Q&A, written by Vikas Swarup, explore the theme of poverty and the life in Indias slums. Both the book and the film use techniques such as setting, characterisation and contrast to portray the themes and effects of poverty on Indian people. The two themes of poverty discussed in this essay include corruption and discrimination. Q&A written by Vikas Swarup takes the readers through the life of an uneducated eighteen-year-old waiter Ram Mohammad Thomas after his arrest for the suspicion of cheating after winning a billion rupees in the television show, Who Will Win A Billion?. Slumdog Millionaire, based on Vikas Swarups Q&A, tells the life story of Jamal Malik, an eighteen-year-old Indian chai wallah, who wins twenty million rupees in an Indian show Who wants to be a millionaire? and is also arrested for suspicion of cheating. In order to prove the protagonists innocence, both the novel and the film tell the protagonists life stories in parallel with the quiz shows questions. This effect makes the stories intriguing and complex yet each story reveals the reason why the protagonist was able to successfully answer each question asked in the end. Through the protagonists stories, the readers explore the poverty aspects of India. The setting of both Slumdog Millionaire and Q&A is set in the poor section of Indian society at slum and chawls. In the novel, Swarup describes the chawl as the smelly armpit of Mumbai with a bundle of one-room tenements occupied by the lower-middle classes. Swarup describes what it is like to live in a chawl under a common roof, the inconvenience of all using a toilet and residents lack of control of their privacy. With the film shot in India, the director shows life in chawls and slums through dirty and crowded images from the very start of the film as the boys were running away from the airport security guards, which uses low angle camera shot placed at the wheel of the motorbike looking up to the running boys. This technique gives the audiences a sense as if the poor and uneducated lower-class is the dominant feature of India. Rushing with the running boys, the camera shoots a range of images with people washing clothes in dirty water, the crowded streets of India trash and beggars, and a zoom-out bird-eye view of rusty tin houses. Both texts frequently alternate the setting between the protagonists life stories and the quiz show settings. The film contrasts colours of shiny urban black and blue of the show and the earthy brown of India to emphasize Indian peoples awful life standard. Being able to visualize the slums and chawls of India, I find that the film is easier to understand what life is like in India. Setting the texts in the poor section of Indian society engages the audiences to think of how lucky they are and therefore sympathize towards the suffering of Jamal and his brother on their journey of surviving. Slumdog Millionaire and Q&A use characterization to develop the theme of discrimination between the poor and the rich. The film uses camera shots, character facial expressions and body language to convey the message. In the film, discrimination is constructed through Jamal and Salims impuissant expression as they were trying to attract the police attention to the Hindus slaughter on the other side. Because of their ragged clothing and common dirty look, the police paid no attention to their presence. Furthermore, the filmmakers contrast the innocent look of the boys Jamal and Malik when they were

playing peacefully in the washing area to contrast their painful loss of mother later and therefore enhance the audiences engagement to empathize the boys impotence because of their status. The novel is written in the perspective of the protagonist, which is more credible as it gives the character more depth and the readers are able to see his good and bad sides. This technique gives a lot of details about the characters thoughts and feelings. It enables the readers to understand the character very well. In the novel, discrimination is conveyed throughout the text. Because of Rams background, the rich, police and the white people look down to him as a new species of monkey... Monkeys do not speak. Especially not in English, even though he could. Later, the novel shows how the Western money and its language can have great influence on India I reply in English... her severe features soften somewhat. In both texts, greed of money is the driving force of corruption. In the film, because of his deficiency of money, Salim has no power or protection. From an innocent young boy, he learns to kill and become a right-hand killer for a mafia warlord. From the answer to the second question in the quiz, the truth alone triumphs, the film evokes the audiences to think of how while with such enforcing laws and values, India is still ranked to be one of the country with the most criminal and poor life. India is a country of corruption and favouritism. As long as money is there to be bribed and knowing the right people, any commit of crime or offenders can be spared. This idea is brought across in the film where there is no mention of the police tracing out the mafia beggars, as well as Salims assassination jobs for the mafia warlord. While this idea is more difficult to bring across in the film since it does not point out directly but needed to be analysed, the idea is better brought across in the novel: dreams have power only over your own mind; but with money you can have power the mind of others. I find the novel uses characterization to a better extend to convey the theme of discrimination because it gives the readers access to Rams thoughts and feelings and his perspective of India better than the film. The film Slumdog Millionaire and Q&A written by Vikas Swarup explores the themes of corruption and discrimination in India due to poverty through life stories of the two eighteen-year-old common uneducated protagonists. Both texts use settings, contrast and characterization to convey the idea in similar and different ways. Slumdog Millionaire uses visual language, mainly through the plot and the actions of their characters while Q&A carries the message across through the protagonists mind. From the texts, it is a common belief and holds true that in India everything is possible with money, and the society is filled with corruption and discrimination. The film and the novel allow the audience to understand what it is to be poor and therefore make them feel thankful for what they have.