Eternal Echoes of The Ray Effect in Bangla Cinema

 

Cinema is a form of art that reflects life in moving picture. But what is it to me? It is not so easy for me to explain what cinema is, but I think in my mind, cinema is always something that make me feel emotions and understand life a little bit better. The whole cinema industry is very big and about a little more than 100 years old. Among them, Bangla cinema holds a small portion but carries a great memoir. Did you hear the name of directors like Christopher Nolan, Martin Scorsese, Akira Kurosawa? Do you know they all had been influenced by a Bengali filmmaker Satyajit Ray? Have you felt shocked knowing this fact? Well, buckle up and let’s dive into the world of Ray’s vision in the lifespan of cinema.

Growing up in Calcutta (Kolkata), he got the earlier exposure of storytelling from his grandfather. Later in his career he grew interest in both western and Indian culture. After written several screenplays for some theatre project he became passionate to make a movie on the novel ‘Pather Panchali’ by Bibhuti Bhushan Banerjee.

He started making his dream project ‘Pather Panchali’ in 1952. The most surprising in all of this is he chose artists that never even been screen tested before, cinematographer that never shot a scene before and to make the cherry on top, Ray himself never directed anything in his life. Despite all of that, he created magic on the screen. The experience of seeing the perspective of a young boy Apu and a young girl named Durga about a train passing by can be hard to swallow yet mesmerizing. Apu’s world drastically changed and left an impression on me about love, fight and endure. Ray's vision was so real that I felt I have led that life.

                                                  picture: Poster of ‘Pather Panchali’ 

He gave birth to a new kind of cinema through his first film which is called parallel cinema movement; the kind where human emotions are shown with such authenticity and simplicity. It was a escape from the formulaic narratives from mainstream.

After Pather Panchali, he made to sequels of the Apu trilogy. He also directed films like Jalshaghar, Devi, Charulata, Nayak, Goopy Gyne Bagha Byne etc. What made him very special as director was his vision of making a cinema.

For example, in his cinema ‘Nayak’, it tells the story of a successful popular actor of Bengal Cinema named Arindam. The cinema is basically the mirror of his life and how he views it. In a train journey Arindam find himself with Aditi who wants to document personal information from the actor and publish it for her magazine. He rejects it gently but later find himself in a dream while taking a nap. In this iconic scene we see, He find himself drowning in a pile of money. Then he sees his mentor Shankar da and ask for help who told him to stay true to the art of cinema and not be violated by the industry. Shankar da refuses to help him as the whole sequence shows how the actor's life has changed from a true theatre character artist to just a rich man with no real passion to the art. The level of self-realization shown in this scene is so deep as well as meaningful and particularly how it was shown, that too for a film made in 1966, is unbelievably surprising.

 

                                          picture: The iconic dream scene from 'Nayak'

Well, rumor has it that he had some pet alien that gave him the divine power of storytelling and vision. I cannot confirm this news's authenticity but as a cinema lover I can definitely verify from my side about his contribution to world cinema through our mother tongue. It is so pleasing because of the pride it brings to us yet devastating because he is no more and didn’t experience the modern technology of cinema making. His great works brought him the 'Honorary Academy Award' just 24 days before his death. As Ray once said, “There is always some room for improvisation”, let’s hope that Bangla cinema will reach to its peak again someday where the great man left it and it can echo through the world eternally.