If that hints at a new way forward for the film industry in this credit-crunch era, so does the theme of Slumdog Millionaire. One of the delights of Beaufoy's script is a contradiction: the portrayal of a city obsessed with amassing wealth – the hustle, the deal, the next get-rich-quick scheme – with a romantic young man at its centre who cares nothing for money. Instead, the overwhelmingly important thing in his life is his love for Latika, a slum girl he has known since childhood. He loses her for years at a time, and finally finds her living as a wealthy gangster's girlfriend and pleads with her to run away with him. "What will we live on?" she asks anxiously, in the story's key exchange. "Love," he says, simply.