Ritwik Ghatak, despite being one of the greatest and most iconoclastic filmmakers India has ever produced, never received due recognition for his genius during his lifetime. The fact that he was asocial in nature, an alcohol addict and a hardline communist, ensured that he died a deeply misunderstood man. Ajantrik, made 6 years after his debut movie Nagarik (often considered India’s first neorealist and arthouse film, preceding Satyajit Ray’s Pather Panchali by 3 years), and one of only 8 completed feature films made by him, bears ample testimony to his exceptional talents. One of the earliest movies to have an inanimate object as one of the protagonists, Ajantrik is the tale of the unique and profound attachment that Bimal, a poor Bengali taxi-driver, shares with his rickety (and hilariously anachronistic) 1920 Chevrolet jalopy which he affectionately calls Jagaddal. Kali Bannerjee gave an incredibly layered, tour-de-force performance as Bimal, a hotheaded, friendless and forever misunderstood loner (ironically, a touch of the director himself perhaps?), whose only companion is the dilapidated Jagaddal. His emotional journey, from pride through anger and devastation to peace, must be seen in order to be truly appreciated. The tragi-comic movie, which is filled with a plethora of cinematic techniques and generic conventions as also strong social commentary, might easily have been a reference point for Ray’s Abhijan, which in turn seemed to have at some level influenced Scorsese’s Taxi Driver, as noted by me sometime back in this article on Ray.
Director: Ritwik Ghatak
Genre: Drama/Social Drama/Slice of Life
Language: Bengali
Country: India
6 comments:
That's a wonderful poster. I happened to watch a fair few of Ghatak's films at Nandan during a festival of his they had but not the couple you mention here. Will look out for these two.
They showed a lot of his documentary short films in the festival and his last uncompleted film on a painter. The documentary films showed, more than the films themselves how tough it was for these directors as to feed themselves they had to make films for the government which had little artistic consequence as I understand.
Yeah, this is indeed a wonderful poster, and, well, the movie is even more wonderful. Really awesome to know that you were fortunate to watch his films in big screen at Nandan. His feature films are easy to get hold of, but not so as far a number of his documentaries go - My Lenin for instance (which, by the way, I'd really want to watch).
Yes, life isn't easy for an arthouse filmmaker; and it was especially difficult for Ritwik Ghatak. Leave aside the monetary aspects, the worst punishment for an artist of Ghatak's calibre was to be denied recognition and respect during his timeline. That really killed him (both literally and figuratively).
Thanks for stopping by.
I did watch My Lenin. It had footage of people who were followers of Lenin and the clamour of Lenin being shouted by a narrator of the film. It became repetitive after a while but I guess the idea was to capture the spirit of Lenin among followers mixing it with the footage.
Badi Theke Paliye is a personal favorite of mine for the shots of Calcutta among other things but I guess on the issue of his communist beliefs and what became of him, since we are discussing that, Jukti, Takko aur Gappo is the best film for this. Made at the fag end, it shows the sad state Ghatak was at the time. :(
Two subjects were very close to Ritwik Ghatak's heart - partition & communism. So, it is from the that point of view that I'm really interested in watching My Lenin.
Its interesting that you mentioned Bari Theke Paliye. Even though the movie released around the time as Truffaut's 400 Blows, and though they had similar plots, the former remained an obscure film for a long time, unlike the latter which became a darling of the festival circuit.
Yes, Jukti Takko Aar Gappo, which released just 2 years before his premature death, was the most autobiographical, and consequently perhaps the most personal film of his.
The dark melodrama "Meghe Dhaka Tara" ("The Cloud Capped Star")is one of the greatest Indian films I have ever seen, and it's the one Ghatek that rates with the best of Ray. But I haven't seen this film, so I can corroborate what I am sure is true. Wonderful poster indeed.
Thanks Sam. Yes, Meghe Dhaka Tara remains Ritwik Ghatak's most famous films. But there are a few more of his movies that could be placed on the same pedestal, like Subarnarekha, Komol Gandhar, etc. Ajantrik, on the other hand, was a relatively underrated work, but well, I loved it.
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