Thursday, 06.06.2024, 8 pm
Ruchir Joshi (Kolkata)
Two Views of the City: Ray and Ghatak
Made within three years of each other, and both led by ‘middle-class’ working women protagonists. Ray’s Mahanagar (The Big City, 1963) and Ritwik Ghatak’s Meghe Dhaka Tara (The Cloud-capped Star, 1960) provide overlapping yet radically divergent visions of post-independence, post-Partition Calcutta. Ghatak’s particularly different approach to cinema and Bengal throws an illuminating bounce-light on Ray’s practice at that time, his world-view and and his cinematic handwriting.
Ruchir Joshi is a film-maker, columnist and writer based in Kolakata.
Screening: MAHANAGAR (THE BIG CITY), India 1963, 128 min. Screening at 6 pm: MEGHE DHAKA TARA (THE CLOUD-CAPPED STAR), India 1960, 127 min.