Satyajit Ray Received an Academy Award for His Lifetime Achievement Just Satyajit Ray: Part One Before His Death in Calcutta
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14 Two decades ago Satyajit Ray received an Academy Award for his Lifetime Achievement just Satyajit Ray: Part One before his death in Calcutta. Since then India has become vastly wealthier. Introducing part one of our two-month retrospective, Ray’s biographer The key to understanding the appeal of But what makes Ray virtually unparalleled Andrew Robinson asserts that the director’s films Satyajit Ray’s body of work is that the is his versatility. He wrote his scripts have lost none of their power, humanity, humour director himself, though intimately rooted solo, and they were often original in Bengal, was also immersed in western screenplays. He designed the sets and and topicality for both Indians and the world. culture: European and Hollywood films, costumes down to the smallest details. He of course, but also literature, art and acted out the roles for his actors with music. ‘I’m thankful for the fact that I’m consummate nuance. He operated the familiar with both cultures and it gives camera and he edited each frame. He me a very much stronger footing as a composed the music, scoring it in a filmmaker,’ Ray told me. One of his most mixture of western and Indian notation. admired films, Charulata, was directly He even designed the credits and posters. inspired by his love of Mozart’s operas. Akira Kurosawa said of Ray: ‘The quiet Born in Calcutta in 1921, Ray was but deep observation, understanding educated in both Bengali and English, and love of the human race which are and studied for a fine arts degree, which characteristic of all his films, have he abandoned for a job as a commercial impressed me greatly.’ At a time when artist in advertising. As a filmmaker, the razzamatazz of Bollywood too often Ray was entirely self-educated, except dominates Indian culture, it will be a for a brief period helping Jean Renoir, treat to experience – in prints faithfully who had come from Hollywood to make restored by the Academy Film Archive The River. The strongest influence on his – an alternative, subtler and richer first film, Pather Panchali, was seeing cinematic vision of India and the human the neo-realist classic, Bicycle Thieves, condition: the universe of Satyajit Ray. in London in 1950: ‘It gored me,’ said Ray. See p7 for other Ray events. Ray’s films cover an exceptional range of Presented in collaboration with moods and genres: from the epic tragedy The Academy of Motion Picture of the Apu Trilogy to the black comedy of Arts and Sciences The Middle Man, from the ghost story Monihara to the children’s fantasy The Adventures of Goopy and Bagha, with hugely popular songs by Ray (two of these will screen next month, in the second part of our Ray season). WHAT’S ON 15 Film Season | Satyajit Ray INTRO INTRO Pather Panchali Aparajito The Philosopher’s Stone The Music Room Song of the Little Road The Unvanquished Parash Pathar Jalsaghar India 1955. With Kanu Banerjee, India 1956. With Kanu Banerjee, India 1957. With Tulsi Chakravarti, India 1958. With Chhabi Biswas, Karuna Banerjee, Subir Banerjee. Karuna Banerjee. 108min. EST. U Ranibala. 111min. EST Padma Devi, Pinaki Sen Gupta. 122min. EST. U The second Apu film, in which the Though not a major film, by Ray’s own 100min. EST. U Ray’s debut established his credo that boy grows into a college student, admission, this is among his funniest. The fatal obsession with classical ‘the really crucial moments in a film is perhaps under-appreciated. Yet, it A humble Calcutta clerk, wondrously Indian music and dance of an should be wordless’. The eventful story has the deepest characterisation, played by Tulsi Chakravarti, living a imperious Bengali landowner in his of the uneventful village childhood of especially the searing conflict between humdrum life, stumbles across a stone decaying palace was not something Apu, from a novel by Bibhutibhushan the mother and her adolescent son; while returning from his office. To his Ray expected would appeal to viewers Banerjee, is punctuated with some of and the first part of the film, set in amazement, it turns all it touches into outside India. But in fact The Music the most lyrical scenes ever seen on holy Varanasi (Banaras), is among gold. Suddenly, the clerk is one of the Room entranced western audiences, screen: the coming of the monsoon Ray’s finest work. It won the Golden most sought-after society figures. But especially in France, where it directly accompanied by Ravi Shankar’s music, Lion at Venice and was the favourite then his secret gets out, and all hell inspired Gérard Depardieu’s interest in and, most famously, Apu’s encounter of Ray’s fellow Bengali directors, breaks loose. Ray. Chhabi Biswas gives a monumental, with his first steam train. Ritwik Ghatak and Mrinal Sen. at times mesmerising performance, Joint ticket available with Aparajito Joint ticket available with and the music comes from some of and The World of Apu; £22.50, Pather Panchali and The World of Apu; the greatest performers in 1950s India. concs £15 (Members pay £1.50 less) £22.50, concs £15 *Introduced by Philip Kemp *Introduced by Michael Lawrence (Members pay £1.50 less) Thu 15 Aug 18:10 NFT1* Thu 15 Aug 20:45 NFT1 Fri 16 Aug 20:40 NFT3 Sat 17 Aug 20:45 NFT1 Sun 18 Aug 16:00 NFT1 Sun 18 Aug 18:30 NFT1 Sat 24 Aug 18:30 NFT1 Thu 22 Aug 18:10 NFT1* Follow us 16 WHAT’S ON Film Season | Satyaji Ray The World of Apu Devi Rabindranath Tagore + Sukumar Ray Apur Sansar The Goddess India 1961. 54min. EST India 1987. 30min. EST India 1958. With Soumitra Chatterjee, India 1960. With Chhabi Biswas, Ray made the moving documentary Sukumar Ray, made for his birth Sharmila Tagore, Alok Chakravarti. Soumitra Chatterjee, Sharmila Tagore. Rabindranath Tagore for the birth centenary, emphasizes Sukumar 103min. EST. U 93min. EST. PG centenary of the poet, writer, painter Ray’s much-loved work as a writer Ray did not originally intend to make Although Ray’s films are full of imagery and song composer, who wrote India’s and illustrator of Bengali nonsense a third Apu film, but at Venice, under about Hinduism, they generally avoid national anthem and was its first verse – comparable with Lewis Carroll press questioning after the success of confronting religious orthodoxy directly. Nobel laureate. The film was funded and Edward Lear – and closes with Aparajito, he found himself announcing Devi is an exception. An ageing by the Indian government, but was his poignant premature death, a trilogy. In the youthful Soumitra landowner, disturbingly played by also a personal tribute. Tagore had when his son Satyajit was just Chatterjee and the teenaged Sharmila Chhabi Biswas, dreams that his been a close friend of Ray’s grandfather two years old. Tagore, he found the perfect actors to beautiful daughter-in-law is an and father, Sukumar Ray, both writers play Apu and Aparna. The story of incarnation of a goddess. Crowds come and artists; moreover, as a child Ray their bizarrely arranged marriage, to worship her, despite her modern had known Tagore and later attended transformed by love before being husband’s horror. The film is set in his university as a student of fine arts. struck by tragedy, is told with many the 1860s, but its contemporary The trickiest challenge was shortage wonderful comic moments. resonance has increased over the of film footage, solved with some past half-century since it was made. Joint ticket available with Pather sensitive dramatizations of Tagore’s Panchali and Aparajito; £22.50, early life. concs £15 (Members pay £1.50 less) Sun 18 Aug 20:45 NFT1 Mon 19 Aug 18:20 NFT1 Mon 19 Aug 20:40 NFT2 Tue 27 Aug 18:30 NFT1 Sat 24 Aug 20:45 NFT1 Mon 26 Aug 16:00 NFT2 WHAT’S ON 17 Film Season | Satyajit Ray INTRO Three Daughters Kanchenjungha The Expedition Charulata Teen Kanya India 1962. With Chhabi Biswas, Abhijan The Lonely Wife India 1961. With Anil Chatterjee, Alaknanda Roy, Karuna Banerjee. India 1962. With Soumitra Chatterjee, India 1964. With Soumitra Chatterjee, Chandana Banerjee, Aparna Das Gupta. 102min. EST Waheeda Rehman, Ruma Guha Thakurta. Madhabi Mukherjee. 117min. EST. U (The Postmaster. 56min/Samapti. 56min/ Ray’s first colour film skilfully exploited 150min. EST. PG Ray justifiably regarded Charulata, Monihara. 61min). Total 173min. EST. U the atmosphere of the famous Neglected outside Bengal, The Expedition based on a Tagore novella, as his most These touching short features derive hill-station Darjeeling beneath the was a hit at home, because of its accomplished film. Almost everything from three Tagore short stories with snow-capped Himalayan peak of elements of melodrama, including a – from the plush Victorian settings a female central character, set in the Kanchenjungha. For wealthy Bengalis, car chase, drug-running, a punch-up and probing camerawork to the 1890s. The Postmaster, a two-hander Darjeeling is a place to escape from and low-life comedy with the brilliant rich and witty script, Tagore’s music about a sensitive orphan servant girl the heat and grime of Calcutta: a Rabi Ghosh, and also because it and the flawless performances, and a lonely city-bred postmaster romantic setting where conventional starred the Bollywood heroine, especially by the entrancing Madhabi stuck in a backwoods village, is among values may not always prevail. Will the Waheeda Rehman, as a village girl Mukherjee – feels perfect. The Ray’s greatest films: a gem, sparkling young woman at the centre of Ray’s forced into prostitution. The central triangular relationship between a rich with pathos and comedy.