Reviews

I have been a fan of Ray for a long time and I have seen most of his famous films. This film was not available for some time because the quality of the film was deteriorating so badly that they had to restore the entire film. Originally made with three entirely unrelated short stories by Nobel Prize winner Rabindranath Tagore, the restored version has only two stories of the original three. In both the stories Postmaster and Samapti you will find the inimitable Ray touch. You can see the same neo realistic portrayal of simple lives and events of ordinary people. Postmaster evokes a feeling of pity for the young girl, but at the same time it seems to reflect the strength and courage of ordinary people going about their lives. The second story "samapti", though not as tight as the first (it winds around a bit before it reaches a climactic finish) again pours life into a simple story about a young girl who is reluctant to let go of her childhood and who is pushed into the world of adulthood. Aparna Sen ( Ray finds such beautiful women to play in his movies) plays this part brilliantly. The picturisque Bengal country side comes to life in this colourful black and white film. A must see for anyone who likes films.

Excellent film. Captures the essence of religious superstition verses spirituality. Shot in glorious black and white the film is essentially about a 17 year old bride ( played by Sharmila Tagore)whose atheist husband goes away for further studies leaving her with his family in a rural town in Bengal. Her devout father-in-law, who is an ardent worshipper of the goddess Kali, has a vision that his daughter-in-law is actually an incarnation of the goddess. The devoted daughter-in-law, initially, plays along for the fear of hurting his feelings but as the movie progresses she gets caught up in the ritualistic practices and starts to believe that she is actually the goddesses incarnate. I have actually seen things like that happen and I think Ray captured the mass hysteria of an entire town very well. The struggle between the son who is a spiritual man but is not superstious and his father is well portrayed. Over all an excellent film, not on par with the Apu trilogy however.