The big city

Original title: Mahanagar

Director: Satyajit Ray

Cast: Anil Chatterjee, Madhabi Mukherjee, Haren Chatterjee, Jaya Bhaduri.

India 1963 | Black & White | 135 mins | Drama | Family

Avaliable on: DCP

Wonderfully enjoyable, with the scope and density of a richly absorbing novel, Satyajit Ray's tale of family and city life is set in mid-50s Calcutta, a society still adjusting to Independence.

Subrata Mazumdar (Anil Chatterjee), a young bank clerk struggling to support his entire extended family on a meagre salary, is horrified when his wife Arati (a ravishing, spirited performance from Madhabi Mukherjee) dares to challenge his cherished belief that 'a woman's place is with her cooking pots'. She not only takes a job but proves a huge success in the workplace, relishing her new-found independence and thoroughly upsetting the family dynamic. Bengali star Mukherjee, here working with Ray for the first time, confessed herself 'stunned' by his extraordinary 'woman-centred' screenplay, so different from anything she had previously encountered. Yet, for all his focus on Arati, Ray - who is renowned for his breadth of sympathy - also deploys warmth, humour and acute psychological insight in his depiction of Arati's conservative old father-in-law, her studious teenage sister-in-law and her benevolently despotic boss.

 

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