During a visit to a friend’s house, I saw a book on Satyajit Ray lying on his bookshelf. I couldn’t resist and borrowed the book as I had been contemplating knowing more about arguably the India’s best ever filmmaker.
The book was rather simple. Part 1 discussed all his 38 odd films and documentaries that the prolific maestro made over his film career spanning about four decades. Part 2 had interviews with all those who had the good fortune of working with the master and were alive on the date to reminisce about the great filmmaker.
It was most interesting to know how Ray chose his stories, locations, actors, technicians, music, locations etc, shoestring budget at his disposal and his deep commitment to realism.
My readers may recall that I read all the original James Bond books by Ian Fleming, watched Bond movies based thereon and arrived at certain very interesting conclusions.
I decided to do an encore with Ray’s work too. The problem I faced was that his movies were either not easily available, or had bad prints or didn’t have English subtitles. Notwithstanding these constraints, I watched seven movies – Jana Aranya, Shakha Proshakha, Seemabadha, Kapurush, Mahanagar, Ganashatru and Charulata.
It doesn’t befit me to pass any judgment on the master’s work, which is acknowledged worldwide as classic. The movies shook me to the core with their stark realism, problems of rural and urban India and human relationships. And while we outside of Bengal know Bengali actors such as Uttam Kumar, Sharmila Tagore, Suchitra Sen, Aparna Sen and Biswajit, Ray’s go to actors were Soumitra Chatterjee and Madhabi Mukherjee. It was a treat to watch these actors getting into the skin of the character that the situation demanded. It was no surprise that why these and several others (Haradhan Bandopadhyay, Deepankar Dey, Mamta Shankar, Utpal Dutt) were Ray’s go to actors.
Much before the so called “parallel cinema” or neo realist films started doing rounds in Hindi, Ray had already mastered the art of showing the best stories in the most realistic manner and enacted by some of the finest actors.
I salute the great master and body of his work, which must be preserved and popularised to reach out to more and more first time viewers of his classic work like me. Unless, I watched his movies, I didn’t realise what great stuff I had missed out in life.
Arvind Arya blog 
Very well written but I think you have left a great Bengali actor Harinder Nath Chattopadhyay, who was a poeta lso, who acted in many Hindi films and the best was Tere Ghar ke Samney with Dev Sahab, Nutan and Om Prakash.
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Harendranath Chattopadhyay was Sarojini Naidu’s brother and worked in only one Ray’s movie – Seemabadh and that too in a none too important role.
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Sir, Harendranath Chattopadhyay worked in a few other Ray films like Sonar Kella, Goopy Gyne Bagha Byne (both are excellent films worth watching).
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Sir, would suggest a few of Ray films which are a “must watch”:
Pather Panchali, Jalsaghar, Devi, Teen Kanya and Agantuk.
He has also made a few Documentaries like “Sikkim” and a short film “Two” which are equally outstanding.
Apart from being a renowned filmmaker, Satyajit Ray was an acclaimed novelist(his books are still best sellers) and an illustrator.
Infact he began his carrier as a Commercial Illustrator with the then famous British advertising agency, D.J. Keymer.
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I started Pather Panchali and Pratidwandi but the prints were pathetic. Also, though I understand Bangla, but appreciating the full glory of Ray’s work requires subtitles. Thanks for your feedback
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Sir, would suggest a few of Ray films which are a “must watch” : Pather Panchali, Jalsaghar, Devi, Teen Kanya and Agantuk. Also he has made some equally outstanding Documentaries like Sikkim, The Inner Eye and a short film Two. Apart from being a renowned filmmaker Ray was very famous for his literary works like novels and short stories for children (these are still best sellers). He was also a splendid illustrator. In fact he has started his carrier as an illustrator with the then famous British Advertising agency D.J Keymer.
Satyajit Ray was a versatile genius who single handedly used to write scripts for his films, scored music for them, done Set designing also.
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Good Prints of Pather Panchali are available in youtube as well as in a few Web Platform like Klikk.
YouTube Link for Pather Panchali: https://youtube.com/watch?v=CCgVQRoiNdU&si=ioufanJ_u6EBANgA
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Thanks
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Your blog encourages to explore an area totally unknown to me.. let me see…thanks
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