Slumdog Slamdunk.

While Slumdog was winning eight Oscars, I was in the library reading about Afghanistan, Pakistan, the Taliban, the giant military blunder to come, and what the rest of the world is thinking as the United States gears up for another round of "Doing Whatever We Bloody Well Please, Even If We Haven't Thought It Through And It Isn't Good For Anybody, Including Us."

So, having discovered this joyous news online, I suppose I should go and hide my head somewhere. And while I'm at it, perhaps I should subtly correct my casual opinion that the film's success has less to do with the film as a film, and more to do with the film as a cultural artifact in the current global context. After all, as so many educated young writers for the New York Times and such have pointed out, the widespread dislike among the Indian middle-class for the film is merely embarrassment and reluctance to admit to the terrible poverty they routinely ignore. And while I stew in my easily accessible, privelidged-Indian guilt at not being more compassionate and active about the evils consuming my fellow countrymen, I suppose I may as well ignore the something fishy in the global media's undoubtedly skewed focus on this little piece of poverty relative to the vast sea of which it is a part.

Too much perspective is never good, is it? It keeps you from feeling the guilt/shame/joy/sympathy/pity appropriate for a two hour experience of the world.