Slumdog Millionaire

One's surroundings play a large role in determining how one evolves as a person and how one "ends up" in the end. In Slumdog Millionaire, Jamal and Salim are both largely influenced by their surroundings in the slum. Especially after their mother was killed right in front of them, they were forced to use whatever means possible to fend for themselves. They had to steal in order to eat, and they slept in low-down places. School, when compared with survival, was not a top priority. They used primitive instincts in order to live. Although Jamal and Salim both turned out very differently, they were both influenced, or shaped, by their childhood. Salim, overly affected by previously having to use violence and corruption to survive, worked for the very person who oppressed his family when he was younger in order to secure his place in society and to ensure his survival. He adapted his actions to his environment. Jamal, on the other hand, used everything that had affected him and everything he had learned on the streets and in his life in order to win "Who Wants To Be a Millionaire." In the same way that this knowledge from Jamal's past made him destined to win, it also shaped his continuous search, and eventual reunion, with Latika. If both Salim had Jamal had not been "molded" from their past, then they would not have been in the situations, or lives, that they ultimately ended up in.