The Lonely Wife

One of the towering figures of Indian cinema, director Satyajit Ray made three dozen films, including several that critics have called masterpieces. But the film that Ray himself, as well as some critics, considered his best is Charulata, based on the 1901 novella, The Broken Nest by another Indian master, Rabindranath Tagore, a poet, novelist, composer, artist, and winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature. Ray even had a personal connection to Tagore-- his father, who died when Ray was two, had been friends with Tagore. In an interview, the director called Charulata "a film that I would make the same way if I had to do it again." In 1880s Calcutta, Charulata (also known as "Charu") is the beautiful, bored wife of Bhupati, the editor and publisher of a political newspaper. He is consumed with his work and pays little attention to Charu, who spends her time idly observing people she sees outside her elegant home. Bhupati invites Charulata's brother and his wife to stay with them, but they fail to provide a diversion. Charu remains restless and disaffected until her husband's handsome, cultured, and intelligent cousin Amal comes to visit. Charu and Amal are drawn to each other intellectually at first, and before long, emotionally as well. By the time he made Charulata, Ray had established himself as one of India's leading directors. His first feature, 1955's Pather Panchali, was a worldwide sensation and his reputation grew with the two sequels that followed, as well as with Ray's subsequent films over the next decade. In 1961, Ray made an award-winning documentary about Rabindranath Tagore. Like Tagore, Ray was multi-talented. He not only wrote, directed and shot his films, but he also frequently composed their musical scores. In Charulata, there is a ravishingly beautiful scene of Charu on a swing, singing a song. That song was written by Tagore, while the other music in the film is credited to Ray. Charulata was the first time the director operated the camera on one of his films, a practice that he continued throughout his career. He liked the additional control it gave him. Charulata received generally good reviews when it was released in 1964. "The interplay of sophistication and simplicity is extraordinary," wrote Penelope Houston of Sight & Sound magazine. Howard Thompson opened his New York Times review by saying "Nobody but Satyajit Ray could have made Charulata," and added, "the picture is an artistic masterpiece, impeccably performed." However, Thompson grumbled a bit about the film's pace. "As do all Ray films, it moves like a majestic snail." More than half a century later, the film's luster has not dimmed, it has become more burnished. Celebrating the film's fiftieth anniversary, Peter Bradshaw wrote in The Guardian in 2014, "It's just so extraordinarily vivid and fresh...There is such miraculous clarity here, such great acting, staged with theatrical aplomb and shot with unshowy genius... Ray's own artistry and poise emerges very strongly." Director: Satyajit Ray Producer: R.D. Bansal Screenplay: Satyajit Ray, based on the novella by Rabindranath Tagore Cinematography: Subrata Mitra Editor: Dulal Dutta Art Direction: Bansi Chandragupta Music: Satyajit Ray Principal Cast: Sailen Mukherjee (Bhupati), Madhabi Mukherjee (Charulata), Soumitra Chatterjee (Amal), Shyamal Ghoshal (Umapada), Geetali Roy (Mandakini), Bholanath (Koyal (Branath), Suku Mukherjee (Nishikanta), Dilip Bose (Sasanka) 117 minutes by Margarita Landazuri