Behind The Beautiful Forevers

The city of Mumbai has seen much growth in the past years. A string of elegant hotels have been set up for travelers and high-class business men. An ever growing, top of the line airport has been built for those coming in and out of the country. From the outside, Mumbai seems to have taken a liking to being internationally integrated with the rest of world, otherwise known as globalization. This is not the case, however; as seen in Katherine Boo’s novel Behind the Beautiful Forevers: Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity. This novel is set in a slum right next to the Mumbai International Airport called

‘Slumdog Millionaire’ is a film that features a character, Jamil Malik, who lives in Dubai and is considered an ignorant young boy. Jamil Malik had never went to school or college and would not have known any of the answers for the game show, “Who wants to be a Millionaire” but was given the prejudge of being on the show because he grew up in the slums of India. Jamil’s life experiences allowed him an

During the film, the subject of poverty was actively depicted. Even though this issue has raised great concerns for India in the past, statistics show that this problem has gradually decreased. In 1978 the percentage of people living on less than $2

Danny Boyle’s film Slumdog Millionaire follows two brothers from the Juhu slum in Mumbai as they face the trials and tributes of growing up in poverty. Although Salim, the elder brother, is given the same childhood experiences and trauma as his younger brother Jamal, his drive and hunger for power lead him to a life of crime, corruption and misconduct. These actions later have a detrimental effect on his relationship with Jamal, which in turn, becomes his demise. Boyle uses a range of effective film techniques to develop Salim’s growth as a character which helps to communicate the idea that ambition can enhance an individual or be the reason for their downfall. Throughout the film, Boyle uses the varying stages of Salim’s life through

Both the movie Slumdog Millionaire and the novel White TIger were set in India, but the two pieces tended to respresent two ideas that clashed together. In Slumdog Millionaire, the main character is honest and rises above corruption, making it out of the slums of the world and even gets a girl! Balram in White Tiger, however, succeeds in life by become less human and more corrupt. The novel itself pretty much laughs in the face of the usual story of the good guy winning.

In ‘Slumdog Millionaire, ' the director utilized the film sound technique to portray Jamal’s destiny in the form of a sound of a clock ticking. Throughout the movie, the audience is continually reminded/aware of the clock ticking because it represents the countdown of Jamal ‘destiny’ in finding Latika. Boyle signified that destiny and time are a partnership, not a limitation. Nevertheless, people on a regular basis are constantly rushing towards their destiny/goal but soon failing because time/patience’s was thought as a limitation. Henceforth, the life lesson from ‘Slumdog Millionaire’ is that life is not just sailing to one distention and the next but the voyage of memories and challenges faced as well. ‘Slumdog Millionaire’ has shaped my perspective of the future and gifted me with the essential traits/lesson to assist me in the future. Our journey is what defines us, but something we lose for selves into luxurious things that cloud our true identity, like Gatsby.

While it may be easier to persuade yourself that Boo’s published stories are works of fiction, her writings of the slums that surround the luxury hotels of Mumbai’s airport are very, very real. Katherine Boo’s book “Behind the Beautiful Forevers – Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity” does not attempt to solve problems or be an expert on social policy; instead, Boo provides the reader with an objective window into the battles between extremities of wealth and poverty. “Behind the Beautiful Forevers,” then, exposes the paucity and corruption prevalent within India.

Katherine Boo, a staff writer at The New Yorker and former reporter and editor at The Washington Post, has worked for over two decades “reporting within poor communities, considering how societies distribute opportunity and how individuals get out of poverty” (Boo 257). In November 2007, she and her husband, an Indian citizen, moved from the United States to India to study a group of slum dwellers in Annawadi, Mumbai (Boo 249). While studying this group of individuals in India from 2007 to 2011, Boo’s goal was to learn why the individuals within this slum have not banded together against a common enemy in order to gain upward mobility. She illustrates several common issues of developing nations including: corruption, education, the mismanagement of foreign aid, and the possibility for social mobility in her book, Behind the Beautiful Forevers. In this literary work, Boo accurately portrays the acts of corruption and as well as how corruption has entered the sphere of education, which is typically an individual’s only avenue to social mobility and success in that area. She argues that instead of rising up against a higher power, the individuals within the slum fight against one another to get a leg up on their competition, even if it keeps them in the same social class.

While in Slumdog Millionaire, the setting is Mumbai, India. Amir had grown up without his mother and so did Hassan. When Jamal and Salim were younger, their home was destroyed by a hoard of people. Their mother was killed then and they were orphaned. At the orphanage in India, they utilized the children to gather up money by begging for it.

An intense portrayal of life at the extremes, Born into Brothels is a movie that challenges our perception of human resilience. The documentary takes place in Calcutta, India, home to one of the oldest populations and religious doctrines in the world. India is a country with an extraordinary history, yet suffers from massive overpopulation, environmental degradation, extreme poverty, and religious strife. (https://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/in.html) Calcutta is the second largest city in India and one of the largest in the world, the square mileage of its metropolitan area measured at 228.5 sq mi. Within this unforgiving landscape is the red light district, a city within a city, known to openly display many of society's

The life story of the protagonist Jamal Malik in Slumdog Millionaire is built through the game show “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?” and a series of his flashbacks revealing how his life experiences gave him the right answers to every quiz question in the show. It displays the way he formed his destiny. On the day when running away from the Hindu rioters who brutally killed his mother just because of the religious difference, Jamal accidentally met Latika. Driven by the

How has Behind the Beautiful Forevers challenged my perception of overcoming poverty both in the Annawadi slum and globally?

The road and pavement” (Adiga, 259). After becoming a successful entrepreneur Balram is able to reflect on his past and his upbringing and realize that it is the lessons from his life that are responsible for the success. This concept is also studied in the Academy Award winning film Slumdog Millionaire. Jamal Malik, the protagonist of the film, is a slum-boy who grows up travelling across the country with his brother and experiencing jobs and life in new ways. The movie displays how experience education can be more advantageous, in a more entertaining and unique aspect.

In the movie Slumdog Millionaire, Salim and Jamal made many choices that affected them very differently even though they were both presented the same obstacles. In fact, the decisions that Jamal has made throughout his life helped him to acquire all the answers to the questions presented to him on the Indian version of "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire”. The choices that they made were sculpted by their poverty and surroundings. Larry Ervin, the author of Slumdog Millionaire's Artful Dodge - Film Review, states “From the same mother, nurtured by most of the same harrowing experiences, Jamal and Salim follow different paths. The older brother is seduced down the path of money and power, employing his stolen gun in service of a local gangster,

The novel begins in the Mumbai slums where it is every man for themselves. People live on top of one another near an international airport and luxury hotels. The living conditions are harsh, and people must be thrifty scavengers in order to survive and overcome the challenges. It is difficult because it seems everyone is taking advantage of the slum residence and taking away opportunities for them to better themselves. One of the main characters is Abdul