Rating: 4.5/5
Asian Cinema Challenge 2023 | 18/52 | Directed by Satyajit Ray
** SPOILERS FOR PATHER PANCHALI ARE INEVITABLE **
One can't be happy without a family of one's own.
At the end of Pather Panchali, Apu’s sister, Durga, has passed away, so his father, Harihar, and mother, Sarbajaya, pack up to leave their ancestral village in Bengal, moving to Varanasi. This film takes place in 1920. Boats sail up and down the Ganges, which runs alongside the city. People cover the ghats leading down to the river, bathing and paying homage to Vishwanath. Among them is Harihar, who is now a priest. He travels home to find Sarbajaya mopping the floor, worried about Apu wandering the big city.
We meet Apu, friends chasing him through city alleyways. Later, we find him watching his father officiating at the Ganges. Apu wanders off with a pinwheel toy, passing another priest, Kalicharan Banerjee, preaching. He sees a man swinging heavy weights around and watches with curiosity. Back home, Apu’s mother tells Apu to ask the man upstairs, Nanda-baba, for two matches. Apu spies on Nanda-babu briefly, seeing him pull out a bottle of alcohol. When Apu asks for the matches, Nanda-babu tells Apu that the bottle is for his medicine. He gives Apu a box of matches, saying there is no need to replace them.
Back at the Ganges, Kalicharan approaches Harihar, looking for a place to have tea. Kalicharan is starving himself, saving up his earnings from the priesthood to purchase a bride from a decent family. Cut to the city celebrating Dussehra. Sarbajaya suggests that Harihar take Apu to see the Ramlila performance, but Harihar is sick and goes to bed. Sarbajaya wants to call a doctor, but Harihar insists they use some of his herbal medicine. Apu walks in to find his sick father lying in bed. Apu’s friend, Shambhu, calls from the other room — Shambhu is Hindustani and teaching Apu English. Apu’s father tells him to play.
The next day, Harihar goes out to the ghats, despite being sick. He collapses on the steps. The film follows the aftermath of Harihar’s illness and the dynamic it creates between Apu and his mother.
This film came to be through the success of Pather Panchali. Like Pather Panchali, this film is based on Bibhutibhushan Bandyopadhyay’s novel of the same name, drawing from the end of Pather Panchali and the first half of Aparajito. However, in this instance, Sataylit Ray took more artistic license with his storytelling, deviating from the novel to convey a more complex dynamic between Apu and Sarbajaya.
The film explores how Western individualization affects the family and one’s perspective on it. Apu excels in school and is offered a scholarship opportunity. But to do so, he must leave his mother behind. She reluctantly agrees, but the strain it puts on their relationship never goes away. Nearly all the hardships the family faces are in some way the result of British exploitation.
The cinematography is absolutely gorgeous. Subrata Mitra makes excellent use of the narrow city streets, the ghats at the Ganges, and other architectural elements to help frame the characters. Mitra pioneered bounce lighting with this movie, recreating the large-scale diffusion of studio lighting in location shooting.
** MOMENTS I LIKED **
- The scene with Kalicharan and Harihar standing in the rain.
- The juxtaposition of Harihar and the birds flying off.
- The passage of time with the flowers growing.
- The montage of Apu educating himself and growing into a young adult.
After releasing an incredible first picture, Satyajit Ray follows it up with a film that technically exceeds its predecessor in nearly every way. This film is a beautiful document of a specific era of India’s history, made by one of India’s greatest directors.