Cul de Sac Millionaire by Aldrin Calimlim Millions (2004) D: Danny Boyle S: Alex Etel, Lewis McGibbon, James Nesbitt “Start with the money,” says a financially inclined character in Danny Boyle’s Millions. “That’s what people want to know about.” So that’s exactly where I’ll start. The money. Two hundred and twenty nine thousand, five hundred and twenty pounds. All of it inside a big black bag with a big Nike swoosh on its side. Loads and loads of money in a bag that somehow finds its way to seven-year-old Damian Cunningham (the freckled and delightfully innocent Alex Etel), a precocious little boy who spends his time in a make-believe hermitage that he built along a railroad out of electronic appliance boxes, reading about the lives and gruesome deaths of martyrs and saints in his beloved copy of Six O’clock Saints, and even occasionally talking to them in the flesh, halos and all. Religious and uncorrupted, he believes that the bag fell from the sky, that the money is actually from God (who is, presumably, secretly a fan of Nike sports bags), and that by extension it should be given to the poor. Anthony, his prepubescent brother (Lewis McGibbon), the character who is, for a boy of his age, surprisingly well-versed in matters concerning compound interest, amortization, the attainment of maximum rate of returns, and other pecuniary affairs, is quick to protest. No way they’re going to give all of it to the poor. They’re not even going to tell anybody about it, not even their recently widowered dad (James Nesbitt), and certainly not the government, because do you know how much they’ll take away from it when they find out? Forty percent! “Do you know how much that is?” Anthony asks Damian. “Nearly all of it.” So the two keep the money, but not until they realize that in just a few days the Bank of England will be making the transition from the pound to the euro. And unless they spend the money or have it converted by then, they’ll be sixpence, or a brand new iPod, or a PSP, or a fleet of sea scooters, none the richer. Those who may have known of the existence of this largely overlooked 2004 film just now may be wondering whether Danny Boyle actually made this movie about two kids going on a money-changing adventure and shopping spree, or I’ve just mistakenly attached his name to the title instead of writing the name of, say, a virtually unknown Walt Disney/Walden Media-financed director. Well, to clear the mind of each and every cinematic Doubting Thomas reading this, Mr. Boyle did, in fact, make this movie. But then again, who would have thought that Boyle, the guy who revolutionized British cinema with a film about drug addiction, who revealed the darker side of erstwhile Hollywood pretty boy Leonardo DiCaprio, and who warned us that the ever-looming zombie apocalypse would actually not involve zombies but would instead be led by a much more sinister breed of flesh-eaters, would be competent and versatile enough to handle an honest-to-goodness family film that is both mesmerizing and eye-opening, and yet would still be able to preserve his knack for unconventional, hyperkinetic storytelling? Except maybe for the chameleon-like David Lynch himself, the answer is, quite simply, no one. I like to think of Millions as Boyle’s primer to his universally acclaimed 2008 hit, Slumdog Millionaire. Aside from their having fairly similar titles, their being centered on the often troublesome yet predominantly beneficent relationship between brothers, and that brief scene in Millions where Damian and his family enjoy an evening watching Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? (which of course figures heavily in the story of Slumdog Millionaire), both films significantly set forth the role money can have in people’s lives, or more accurately, the role people allow money to have in their lives, as well as ultimately attesting to its ephemerality, be it in pound, euro, dollar, rupee, or peso. So, wouldn’t you rather help millions of people or keep your precious millions all to yourself? Yes, I started with money, and I’ll end with it as well, because that’s what people want to know about. But if there’s one thing people need and should care to know about money, it’s that money is but transitory. As Damian would put it rather succinctly: “Like a Malteser.”

Cul de Sac Millionaire
by Aldrin Calimlim

Millions (2004)
D: Danny Boyle
S: Alex Etel, Lewis McGibbon, James Nesbitt

“Start with the money,” says a financially inclined character in Danny Boyle’s Millions. “That’s what people want to know about.” So that’s exactly where I’ll start.

The money. Two hundred and twenty nine thousand, five hundred and twenty pounds. All of it inside a big black bag with a big Nike swoosh on its side. Loads and loads of money in a bag that somehow finds its way to seven-year-old Damian Cunningham (the freckled and delightfully innocent Alex Etel), a precocious little boy who spends his time in a make-believe hermitage that he built along a railroad out of electronic appliance boxes, reading about the lives and gruesome deaths of martyrs and saints in his beloved copy of Six O’clock Saints, and even occasionally talking to them in the flesh, halos and all. Religious and uncorrupted, he believes that the bag fell from the sky, that the money is actually from God (who is, presumably, secretly a fan of Nike sports bags), and that by extension it should be given to the poor. Anthony, his prepubescent brother (Lewis McGibbon), the character who is, for a boy of his age, surprisingly well-versed in matters concerning compound interest, amortization, the attainment of maximum rate of returns, and other pecuniary affairs, is quick to protest. No way they’re going to give all of it to the poor. They’re not even going to tell anybody about it, not even their recently widowered dad (James Nesbitt), and certainly not the government, because do you know how much they’ll take away from it when they find out? Forty percent! “Do you know how much that is?” Anthony asks Damian. “Nearly all of it.” So the two keep the money, but not until they realize that in just a few days the Bank of England will be making the transition from the pound to the euro. And unless they spend the money or have it converted by then, they’ll be sixpence, or a brand new iPod, or a PSP, or a fleet of sea scooters, none the richer.

Those who may have known of the existence of this largely overlooked 2004 film just now may be wondering whether Danny Boyle actually made this movie about two kids going on a money-changing adventure and shopping spree, or I’ve just mistakenly attached his name to the title instead of writing the name of, say, a virtually unknown Walt Disney/Walden Media-financed director. Well, to clear the mind of each and every cinematic Doubting Thomas reading this, Mr. Boyle did, in fact, make this movie. But then again, who would have thought that Boyle, the guy who revolutionized British cinema with a film about drug addiction, who revealed the darker side of erstwhile Hollywood pretty boy Leonardo DiCaprio, and who warned us that the ever-looming zombie apocalypse would actually not involve zombies but would instead be led by a much more sinister breed of flesh-eaters, would be competent and versatile enough to handle an honest-to-goodness family film that is both mesmerizing and eye-opening, and yet would still be able to preserve his knack for unconventional, hyperkinetic storytelling? Except maybe for the chameleon-like David Lynch himself, the answer is, quite simply, no one.

I like to think of Millions as Boyle’s primer to his universally acclaimed 2008 hit, Slumdog Millionaire. Aside from their having fairly similar titles, their being centered on the often troublesome yet predominantly beneficent relationship between brothers, and that brief scene in Millions where Damian and his family enjoy an evening watching Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? (which of course figures heavily in the story of Slumdog Millionaire), both films significantly set forth the role money can have in people’s lives, or more accurately, the role people allow money to have in their lives, as well as ultimately attesting to its ephemerality, be it in pound, euro, dollar, rupee, or peso.

So, wouldn’t you rather help millions of people or keep your precious millions all to yourself? Yes, I started with money, and I’ll end with it as well, because that’s what people want to know about. But if there’s one thing people need and should care to know about money, it’s that money is but transitory. As Damian would put it rather succinctly: “Like a Malteser.”

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