Neorealism has always owed more to melodrama than some of its purveyors and admirers are willing to admit, but Satyajit Ray unreservedly acknowledged the influence of the latter in his Apu Trilogy. Starting with 1955’s Pather Panchali, his feature debut, Ray crafted a stark vision of India’s transition into the modern age that still offset its most unvarnished observations with a sense of poetry that lent classical grandeur to intimate storytelling.
When Apu’s father, Harihar (Kanu Banerjee), develops a high fever and perishes near the start of 1956’s Aparajito, Ray initially illuminates the banality of such a commonplace, senseless death by focusing on the priest’s ragged breathing and futile attempts to rally himself. When Harihar asks for some water from the Ganges, though, the adolescent Apu’s (Pinaki Sengupta) sprint to and from the river gives the film an operatic feel, culminating in a dying breath matched...
When Apu’s father, Harihar (Kanu Banerjee), develops a high fever and perishes near the start of 1956’s Aparajito, Ray initially illuminates the banality of such a commonplace, senseless death by focusing on the priest’s ragged breathing and futile attempts to rally himself. When Harihar asks for some water from the Ganges, though, the adolescent Apu’s (Pinaki Sengupta) sprint to and from the river gives the film an operatic feel, culminating in a dying breath matched...
- 1/20/2024
- by Jake Cole
- Slant Magazine
Every week, IndieWire asks a select handful of film critics two questions and publishes the results on Monday. (The answer to the second, “What is the best film in theaters right now?”, can be found at the end of this post.)
This week’s question: In honor of “The Florida Project,” which has just started its platform release across the country, what is the greatest child performance in a film?
Jordan Hoffman (@JHoffman), The Guardian, Vanity Fair
I can agonize over this question or I can go at this Malcolm Gladwell “Blink”-style. My answer is Tatum O’Neal in “Paper Moon.” She’s just so funny and tough, which of course makes the performance all the more heartbreaking. She won the freaking Oscar at age 10 for this and I’d really love to give a more deep cut response, but why screw around? Paper Moon is a perfect film and she is the lynchpin.
This week’s question: In honor of “The Florida Project,” which has just started its platform release across the country, what is the greatest child performance in a film?
Jordan Hoffman (@JHoffman), The Guardian, Vanity Fair
I can agonize over this question or I can go at this Malcolm Gladwell “Blink”-style. My answer is Tatum O’Neal in “Paper Moon.” She’s just so funny and tough, which of course makes the performance all the more heartbreaking. She won the freaking Oscar at age 10 for this and I’d really love to give a more deep cut response, but why screw around? Paper Moon is a perfect film and she is the lynchpin.
- 10/9/2017
- by David Ehrlich
- Indiewire
“Songs Of Humanity”
By Raymond Benson
I’ll bet many of you cinephiles out there have heard of Indian filmmaker Satyajit Ray’s acclaimed trilogy of films from the 1950s (Pather Panchali, aka Song of the Little Road, 1955; Aparajito, aka The Unvanquished, 1956; and Apur Sansar, aka The World of Apu, 1959), but have never actually seen them. Here is your chance to rectify that egregious error. Quite simply put, anyone interested in film history needs to have this trio of motion pictures under the belt.
Satyajit Ray, who received an Honorary Oscar for Lifetime Achievement in 1992, began his career as an illustrator of books. One of these was Pather Panchali, a classic of Bengali literature (1928) written by Bibhutibushan Bandyopadhyay, and its sequel, Aparajito (1932). They comprise the story of the growth of a boy from infancy to adulthood over the course of twenty-five years or so (from the 1910s to the 1930s...
By Raymond Benson
I’ll bet many of you cinephiles out there have heard of Indian filmmaker Satyajit Ray’s acclaimed trilogy of films from the 1950s (Pather Panchali, aka Song of the Little Road, 1955; Aparajito, aka The Unvanquished, 1956; and Apur Sansar, aka The World of Apu, 1959), but have never actually seen them. Here is your chance to rectify that egregious error. Quite simply put, anyone interested in film history needs to have this trio of motion pictures under the belt.
Satyajit Ray, who received an Honorary Oscar for Lifetime Achievement in 1992, began his career as an illustrator of books. One of these was Pather Panchali, a classic of Bengali literature (1928) written by Bibhutibushan Bandyopadhyay, and its sequel, Aparajito (1932). They comprise the story of the growth of a boy from infancy to adulthood over the course of twenty-five years or so (from the 1910s to the 1930s...
- 11/28/2015
- by nospam@example.com (Cinema Retro)
- Cinemaretro.com
Pather Panchali/Aparajito/Apur Sansar
Written and directed by Satyajit Ray
India, 1955/1956/1959
The Criterion Collection set of Satyajit Ray’s Apu trilogy has been one of the more eagerly anticipated releases in recent years. These masterworks of world cinema, widely acclaimed for decades, have been long overdue a much-deserved superior treatment on home video. Now though, benefitting from a 4K digital restoration by the Academy Film Archive and L’Immagine Ritrovata, and with a wealth of bonus features, these exceptional films are available in the superb presentation so many have been waiting for.
But to start at the source, such a treatment would not have been warranted in the first place were the films themselves not so remarkable, and that they most certainly are. As no less an authority than Akira Kurosawa puts it, “To have not seen the films of Ray is to have lived in the world without...
Written and directed by Satyajit Ray
India, 1955/1956/1959
The Criterion Collection set of Satyajit Ray’s Apu trilogy has been one of the more eagerly anticipated releases in recent years. These masterworks of world cinema, widely acclaimed for decades, have been long overdue a much-deserved superior treatment on home video. Now though, benefitting from a 4K digital restoration by the Academy Film Archive and L’Immagine Ritrovata, and with a wealth of bonus features, these exceptional films are available in the superb presentation so many have been waiting for.
But to start at the source, such a treatment would not have been warranted in the first place were the films themselves not so remarkable, and that they most certainly are. As no less an authority than Akira Kurosawa puts it, “To have not seen the films of Ray is to have lived in the world without...
- 11/24/2015
- by Jeremy Carr
- SoundOnSight
Dailies is a round-up of essential film writing, news bits, videos, and other highlights from across the Internet. If you’d like to submit a piece for consideration, get in touch with us in the comments below or on Twitter at @TheFilmStage.
Pedro Almodóvar explains why he changed the title of his next film from Silencio to Julieta (via THR), and see a new look above:
When we began with preproduction I found out that Martin Scorsese was going to shoot a film with the same title, but I didn’t mind because I thought that I would use the Spanish title, which sounds much different, in the markets. Scorcese and I have finished shooting our respective films and we know that we will coincide in theaters around the world next year around the same time. Additionally, the novel the film is based on by Shusaku Endo will be rereleased.
Pedro Almodóvar explains why he changed the title of his next film from Silencio to Julieta (via THR), and see a new look above:
When we began with preproduction I found out that Martin Scorsese was going to shoot a film with the same title, but I didn’t mind because I thought that I would use the Spanish title, which sounds much different, in the markets. Scorcese and I have finished shooting our respective films and we know that we will coincide in theaters around the world next year around the same time. Additionally, the novel the film is based on by Shusaku Endo will be rereleased.
- 11/18/2015
- by TFS Staff
- The Film Stage
A portrait of Satyajit Ray by Rishiraj Sahoo | Source: Wikimedia commons
Let’s start to play a game here – What is common between the 9 Bengali films listed below:
1 – Antaheen (2009, dir: Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury) advertised that this was the first film after Satyajit Ray’s Aranyer Din Ratri where Aparna Sen and Sharmila Tagore acted together. It went further stating that even the Ray masterpiece didn’t have the two pitted against each other in the same frame as this film did.
2 – Abar Aranye (2003, dir: Goutam Ghose) took three of the four characters of Aranyer Din Ratri to the forest of Dooars on a sequel train at a time when the DVD, CD version of the Ray original was not readily available.
3 – Aborto (2013, dir: Arindam Sil) flaunts that all the characters of the film have the same names as the different major characters in the master’s film oeuvre.
4 – Charulata 2011 (2012, dir:...
Let’s start to play a game here – What is common between the 9 Bengali films listed below:
1 – Antaheen (2009, dir: Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury) advertised that this was the first film after Satyajit Ray’s Aranyer Din Ratri where Aparna Sen and Sharmila Tagore acted together. It went further stating that even the Ray masterpiece didn’t have the two pitted against each other in the same frame as this film did.
2 – Abar Aranye (2003, dir: Goutam Ghose) took three of the four characters of Aranyer Din Ratri to the forest of Dooars on a sequel train at a time when the DVD, CD version of the Ray original was not readily available.
3 – Aborto (2013, dir: Arindam Sil) flaunts that all the characters of the film have the same names as the different major characters in the master’s film oeuvre.
4 – Charulata 2011 (2012, dir:...
- 7/8/2014
- by Amitava Nag
- DearCinema.com
Apur Panchali, director Kaushik Ganguly’s homage to renowned Bengali director Satyajit Ray’s Apu trilogy, is all set to win over a whole new generation of British cineastes when it premieres at the world’s best cinema, the British Film Institute’s prestigious National Film Theatre 1 on July 14and subsequently at the Cineworld Wembley on July 15 as part of the 5th anniversary celebrations of the London Indian Film Festival.
The event is being held in association with the Satyajit Ray Foundation and the screening will also honour the Foundation’s Founder and Chairperson Pam Cullen, a dear friend and tireless advocate of Ray during his lifetime, and former member of the Free India Movement in her younger days.
The President of the Foundation is Mrs Bijoya Ray and the Vice President is Sandip Ray. The Foundation’s Patrons are a glittering array of film personalities including Lord Attenborough Cbe,...
The event is being held in association with the Satyajit Ray Foundation and the screening will also honour the Foundation’s Founder and Chairperson Pam Cullen, a dear friend and tireless advocate of Ray during his lifetime, and former member of the Free India Movement in her younger days.
The President of the Foundation is Mrs Bijoya Ray and the Vice President is Sandip Ray. The Foundation’s Patrons are a glittering array of film personalities including Lord Attenborough Cbe,...
- 6/28/2014
- by Stacey Yount
- Bollyspice
Get ready London film fans! The fabulous London Indian Film Festival, running July 10th – 17th, will bring you an eclectic and cool mix of films! Now Europe’s largest platform for Indian cinema, the London Indian Film Festival returns to the Capital, in association with Pure Heaven, the British Film Institute, and official Hotel Partner Grange Hotels, celebrating the exploding movement of Indian Independent cinema and bringing to UK audiences a rare selection of cutting-edge films from some of the Indian subcontinent’s hottest independent talents. Going way beyond Bollywood, the festival presents a kaleidoscope of new films that challenge, shock, generate debate and present a more realistic view of India and the subcontinent today, in all its diversity.
The festival has many highlights and will showcase Emma Thompson’s Sold and Million Dollar Arm, which stars Jon Hamm and also boasts a bevy of Bollywood stars! The festival will stretch citywide,...
The festival has many highlights and will showcase Emma Thompson’s Sold and Million Dollar Arm, which stars Jon Hamm and also boasts a bevy of Bollywood stars! The festival will stretch citywide,...
- 6/12/2014
- by Stacey Yount
- Bollyspice
Kaushik Ganguly’s Apur Panchali takes off on Pather Panchali and is about the child actor who played Apu in the film – Subir Banerjee – and what happened to him because he never made another film after Ray’s masterpiece.
Cinema in India has now split up into several pan-Indian categories. Apart from the mainstream Hindi film we have the ‘indie’ cinema represented by films like The Lunchbox and Ship of Theseus as well as the documentary (Fire in the Blood), which has become commercially viable, as it was not. Apart from these categories, there is the regional art film which, unlike its popular counterpart, is pan-Indian rather than local – because it is aimed at audiences at film festivals and other pan-Indian cultural gatherings, and cannot be imagined without subtitles in English. The pan-Indian art film is gaining ground across India and well-known film critics were also recommending the Indian Panorama...
Cinema in India has now split up into several pan-Indian categories. Apart from the mainstream Hindi film we have the ‘indie’ cinema represented by films like The Lunchbox and Ship of Theseus as well as the documentary (Fire in the Blood), which has become commercially viable, as it was not. Apart from these categories, there is the regional art film which, unlike its popular counterpart, is pan-Indian rather than local – because it is aimed at audiences at film festivals and other pan-Indian cultural gatherings, and cannot be imagined without subtitles in English. The pan-Indian art film is gaining ground across India and well-known film critics were also recommending the Indian Panorama...
- 2/13/2014
- by MK Raghavendra
- DearCinema.com
Kaushik Ganguly won the Best Director Award of the 44th International Film Festival of India (Iffi) for Apur Panchali. The award comprises of Silver Peacock, Certificate and a cash prize of Rs. 1.5 million (Usd 24000).
Apur Panchali (Apu’s Song) is a real-life story inspired by Subir Banerjee, the child actor who played the iconic role of Apu in Satyajit Ray’s Pather Panchali. The film released theatrically in August 1955 and it has been 58 long years hence. But ironically Subir never became a part of any film again in his entire life. On his way to receive an award in a film festival in Germany, he reminisces about his life.
Beatriz’s war from East Timor bagged the Golden Peacock for Best Film and a cash prize of Rs. 4 million (Usd 64000). The film is directed by Luigi Acquisto and Bety Reis.
Alon Moni Aboutboul won the Best Actor (Male) award for...
Apur Panchali (Apu’s Song) is a real-life story inspired by Subir Banerjee, the child actor who played the iconic role of Apu in Satyajit Ray’s Pather Panchali. The film released theatrically in August 1955 and it has been 58 long years hence. But ironically Subir never became a part of any film again in his entire life. On his way to receive an award in a film festival in Germany, he reminisces about his life.
Beatriz’s war from East Timor bagged the Golden Peacock for Best Film and a cash prize of Rs. 4 million (Usd 64000). The film is directed by Luigi Acquisto and Bety Reis.
Alon Moni Aboutboul won the Best Actor (Male) award for...
- 11/30/2013
- by NewsDesk
- DearCinema.com
Iffi to screen festival favorites Blue is the Warmest Colour, Ilo Ilo, The Past among others
A still from The Coffin Maker
Two Indian Films; Apu’s Song by Kaushik Ganguly and The Coffin Maker by Veena Bakshi have been selected in the International Competition section at the International Film Festival of India (Iffi) to be held in Goa from November 20-30, 2013.
Apu’s Song is a real-life story inspired by Subir Banerjee, the child actor who played the iconic role of Apu in Satyajit Ray’s Pather Panchali. The film released theatrically in August 1955 and it has been 58 long years hence. But ironically Subir never became a part of any film again in his entire life. On his way to receive an award in a film festival in Germany, he reminisces about his life.
The Coffin Maker by Veena Bakshi (India) is set in a small village in Goa.
A still from The Coffin Maker
Two Indian Films; Apu’s Song by Kaushik Ganguly and The Coffin Maker by Veena Bakshi have been selected in the International Competition section at the International Film Festival of India (Iffi) to be held in Goa from November 20-30, 2013.
Apu’s Song is a real-life story inspired by Subir Banerjee, the child actor who played the iconic role of Apu in Satyajit Ray’s Pather Panchali. The film released theatrically in August 1955 and it has been 58 long years hence. But ironically Subir never became a part of any film again in his entire life. On his way to receive an award in a film festival in Germany, he reminisces about his life.
The Coffin Maker by Veena Bakshi (India) is set in a small village in Goa.
- 11/13/2013
- by NewsDesk
- DearCinema.com
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