a film often compared to Oliver! & The 400 Blows by Mira Nair   Reviews

General Information   a picture of Bombay Images of Bombay (remote; from Bombay)    Image of Ganesh, or Ganpati is the elephant God (source)

1. Pay attention to Krishna, the other children (Manju, sweet sixteen) and the adults (Baba, his wife, Chillum).  Analyze the themes of a. family relationships and b. comradship and betrayal

• the importance of family and home to Krishna:

e.g. Why does he need 500 rupees?  (his relations with his brother-setting fire to his brother's bike)
       His letter; his "name" in Bombay--Chaipau
       His "family" in Bombay--Chillum, Manju and her mother, the sweet 16
• Chillum--drifting all over India, no friends, a drug addict
• Manju's family--a father (Baba) who lives on his wife's prostitution (called pimp); Is the mother a good mother?
• comradship and betrayal: Krishna's relationships with the other street kids

e.g. Manju--

2.  Bombay and its social problems of poverty, drug dealing, prostitution and class difference.

• class difference and the depiction of slum--drug & prostitution; e.g. the wedding banquet scene

(Chungal is not afraid of beating up the rich kid, but later Krishna and Manju are caught by the police being suspected of stealing money.)
• Dominant scenes --train station; the first few cuts between the homeless and the statues.

 

 
 
 

3. the national/colonial and the personal

• the role foreigners--the journalist, the one who buys drug from Chillum
• the role of the State--"Chiller room" (Children's room)  as the State's intervention in "solving" the social problems,  cricket game,
• the role of religion (image of Ganesh at the end)
• the roles of music and movie (the song "Hawaii girl"), movies e.g. the children's singing love songs after robbing money

• History of the movie:

"The history of the making of "Salaam Bombay!" is almost as interesting as the film itself. The filmmakers gathered a group of the street children of Bombay and talked with them about their experiences,
  visiting the streets and train stations, bazaars and red-light districts where many of them lived. Out of these interviews emerged a screenplay that was a composite of several lives. Then many of the children were enlisted for weeks in a daily workshop, not to teach them "acting" (for that they already knew from hundreds of overacted Indian  film melodramas), but to teach them how to behave naturally in front of the camera."  (Roger Ebert's review)
• The protagonist-- Krishna
"When he arrives in Bombay, Krishna finds a lowly job as a chaipau (one who delivers tea) in a red-light district with its splashy bordellos." (Kempley's review)
 
 

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The director, Mira Nair
"The highly acclaimed director from India, Mira Nair leapt into the world's spotlight with her film Salaam, Bombay! This film is considered by many to be her best work although she may be better known for the controversial subject matter of her latest film Kama Sutra: A tale of Love. " (Mira Nair)

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Reviews
• Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times
• Washington Post
• Indian Film: The Indian Film Industry