Lion

Based on a true story, Lion is an old-fashioned, crowd-pleasing film that succeeds on its own admittedly less-than-ambitious terms. It has been accused of sidestepping the problems it implicitly raises (namely, the 'white saviour' trope and the economic and racial inequality born of globalisation) in favour of a sentimental, feelgood reunion storyline. That’s somewhat unfair. But while it doesn’t completely ignore issues of race and privilege, it certainly doesn’t prioritise them. Instead, it focuses on the readymade universal appeal of emotional globalisation.

When five-year-old Saroo (the adorable Sunny Pawar), an Indian boy living in extreme poverty, becomes separated from his family after boarding a train that ends up thousands of miles from home, in Calcutta, he becomes trapped in a series of harrowing, Dickensian nightmare scenarios. Too young to know his surname, or even the correct name of his hometown, Saroo eventually ends up at an orphanage before being adopted by well-off couple John and Sue (David Wenham and Nicole Kidman) and whisked halfway around the world to a life of privilege in Australia. Eventually the adult Saroo (Dev Patel) decides to search for the location of his birthplace and his original family by using Google Earth, straining his relationships with his adoptive parents and girlfriend Lucy (Rooney Mara) in the process.

It’s difficult not to be moved by Saroo’s plight and eventual triumph, and director Garth Davis (Top of the Lake) shows a knack for blending small, emotionally intimate scenes with an impressive sense of geographic scale and scope. Anyone looking for real political critique should go elsewhere, but for pure emotional catharsis, Lion delivers. 

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Released by Entertainment Film

Follow Michelle Devereaux on Twitter at @mldevereaux