That being said, I'm a little conflicted about the responsibility the media seems to be putting on the filmmakers regarding the children actors from the film. Take this article from yesterday's New York Times: "‘Slumdog’ Filmmakers Meet With Actors’ Families".
I agree that the plight of these and all people living in shanty homes is tragic. But, as long as the producers and studio have fairly compensated everyone involved, then isn't the business agreement over?
Are the Hollywood studios and producers responsible for whatever actors do with the crazy amounts of money they're paid? Because if that's the case, they're the main cause of 99% of Los Angeles' expensive crashed cars, drugs and hookers.
Or because those are the so-called "victimless crimes" it's okay?
So are Warner Brothers, Legendary Pictures, Christopher Nolan and the producers of The Dark Knight at all responsible for Heath Ledger's tragic drug overdose? I mean, isn't it wholly possible that he was so into his psychotic role that it drove him to prescription pills? Shouldn't they foot the bill for his untimely death?
Or even back fifty years - James Dean - are Warner Brothers and Rebel Without a Cause director Nicholas Ray responsible for his death, what with putting him through the troubled teenage angst of Jim Stark?
Are these too far fetched because they involve adults (or, at the very least, people over 18) and because they involve death? That these Slumdog actors are children, so it's very different?
Because if that's it then I have a whole host of child actors who got pretty screwed up - Drew Barrymore, River Phoenix, Brad Renfro, Darlene Gillespie, Kelly and Jack Osbourne, Carl Switzer, the Olsen twins, the Coreys Feldman and Haim ... or how about the holy trinity of child actors gone wrong - Dana Plato, Todd Bridges and Gary Coleman?
C'mon, you don't think that Patty Duke's bipolar disorder come stem at all from playing both Patty and Cathy Lane in 1963's The Patty Duke Show?
I'm not trying to say that this Slumdog aftermath isn't tragic, but I can't help but wonder if the blame is being unfairly placed upon the creative people who just wanted to tell a great story, and take Westerners to a world they'd never seen before.
