Why did Slumdog Millionaire win an Oscar?

Answer 1

Slumdog Millionare (2008) won a lot of Oscars:

1. Best Achievement in Cinematography - Anthony Dod Mantle
2. Best Achievement in Directing - Danny Boyle
3. Best Achievement in Editing - Chris Dickens
4. Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Score - A.R. Rahman
5. Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Song - A.R. Rahman (music) and Gulzar (lyrics) For the song "Jai Ho".
6. Best Achievement in Sound - Ian Tapp and Richard Pryke and Resul Pookutty
7. Best Motion Picture of the Year - Christian Colson
8. Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material Previously Produced or Published - Simon Beaufoy

It was also nominated for a couple more:

1. Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Song - A.R. Rahman and Maya Arulpragasam For the song "O Saya".
2. Best Achievement in Sound Editing - Tom Sayers and Glenn Freemantle

It won all these Oscars because it got a lot of votes. It got a lot of votes because people in the Academy really, really liked it. Everyone likes rags to riches stories, Fairy Tales with happy endings. Plus this one was set in a real-life slum, so we could feel good about raising the public awareness of such real pain and suffering while letting ourselves believe that good things happen there, too.