Trivia / Lion

• Actor-Shared Background: Nicole Kidman plays Saroo's adoptive mother and the actress herself is one as well.
• Approval of God: The real Saroo Brierly and his family greatly approved of the movie's depiction of his story, being especially happy of the praise it received internationally.
• Award Category Fraud:
  • Dev Patel was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor when he is very clearly the sole lead character. However, they probably got away with this because he's only in the second half of the film, with a different actor playing his younger self in the first half. This caused discussions about if a role is lead or supporting when it's absent from half the story but present for the entirety of the other half. (Nineteen years earlier, Geoffrey Rush won Best Actor for Shine in practically the same situation.)
  • While not nominated, Sunny Pawar was campaigned as a lead, even though his role is about the same exact size as Patel's. This begs the question of which one of these two was placed in the wrong category, as most viewers would agree that wherever one was placed, the other should've followed.
• Fake Australian:
  • Dev Patel and Divian Ladwa are an English men of Indian descent portraying the Indian-Australian Saroo and Mantosh Brierley.
• Career Resurrection: This film's success during awards season and in the box office brought Nicole Kidman back into the spotlight, after a descent beginning in the mid-2000's and reaching rock bottom with the calamitous flop of Grace of Monaco in 2014. While Paddington (2014) released that same year brought some renewed attention, it was Lion being released two years later that re-affirmed Kidman was still an A-lister. Its success heralded her inclusion in increasingly high-profile projects (Big Little Lies, Aquaman, and Being the Ricardos).
• Deleted Scene: A scene where Guddu is arrested for stealing eggs was cut. While being taken away, Guddu asks Saroo to take care of their mother and sister.
• In Memoriam: "In Loving Memory of Guddu."