Synopsis:
Kolkata 1930; Apu/Apurba Kumar Roy (Soumitra
Chatterjee) has quit college due to financial
problems. He leads a precarious existence
but dreams of making it big as a writer
and works on a novel based on his own life.
His friend Pulu (Swapan Mukherjee) invites
him to a village in Khulna to attend the
wedding of one of his cousins. Due to a
quirk of fate Apu himself gets married with
the girl Aparna (Sharmila Tagore). Apu and
Aparna come to Calcutta. Aparna is shocked
by the poverty but soon adjusts with the
conditions. Love blossoms and the couple
enjoy domestic bliss. A pregnant Aparna
returns to her father’s house. She
dies giving birth; Apu’s happiness
is shattered. He holds his son Kajol (Alok
Chakraborty) responsible for Aparna’s
death and roams around aimlessly. When Apu
returns to Khulna, Kajol initially refuses
to acknowledge him as his father. Finally
Kajol relents and the father and son leave
for Calcutta.
The film:
Apur Sansar, the third instalment
of Satyajit Ray’s masterwork 'The
Apu Trilogy' marks the growth of its protagonist
into a man who finds love, loses it tragically,
suffers from morbid depression and who finally
overcomes it to become united with his own
son. The journey of life which began in
Pather Panchali
(1955) and continued through Aparajito
(1956) culminates perfectly in Apur
Sansar with Apu finding salvation in
self-realisation. Although being the third
part of a trilogy, Apur Sansar
is an independent film in its own right
and can be appreciated without previous
knowledge/viewing of the other two films.
In fact, Ray after the box-office failure
of Aparajito took a break from
his beloved Apu and made two completely
different films – Paras Pathar
(1957) and Jalsaghar
(1958)- before returning to the concluding
part of his trilogy.
Apur Sansar is a film structured
in three distinct acts and a prologue. The
brief prologue which comes before the title
sequence shows Apu has to quit studies because
of poverty. The principal’s certificate
precisely establishes the fundamental personality
traits of the film’s central character
– 'sensitive, conscientious and diligent.'
In a distinctive Ray style, the prologue
alludes to the milieu of Kolkata in the
1930s through incessant protest chants in
the background soundtrack.
In the first act the adult Apu is a struggling
writer living in a dingy rented room. Poverty
however has failed to dampen his joie
de vivre and Ray captures his undying
spirit through his bath in the rain and
the way he uses his smooth talking skills
to fob off his landlord who asks for three
month’s due rent. The resilience and
nonchalance with which he sells off his
books and looks for jobs indicate innate
confidence in his abilities as a writer
to make it big one day. Ray also hints to
romantic urges of more physical kind when
like the proverbial Lord Krishna he light-heartedly
plays the flute to charm a young girl living
next door. When his old friend Pulu treats
him to an unexpected visit to the theatre
and a hearty dinner afterwards Apu’s
confidence reaches its zenith – in
the manner of an eternal dreamer he derides
the concept of security as an enemy of great
art. The life of an ordinary clerk is not
an option for Apu; he is completely dedicated
to his 'amazing novel.' Ray elegantly sums
up the story of the Pather Panchali
and Aparajito through the plot
summary of the autobiographical novel that
Apu narrates to Pulu. His euphoria is undercut
with a wry sense of humour – a hallmark
of Ray’s dialogue writing skills -
Pulu reminds him that just a few years back
he was a 'country bumpkin' who got his first
taste of literature in his college days
from the very Pulu who’s 'materialism'
Apu is now ridiculing.
Apu’s sudden wedding constitutes
the dramatic high point of the first act.
Apu reacts furiously when Pulu requests
him to marry the bride Aparna because the
intended bridegroom has turned out to be
a half-wit. Apu’s irate speech against
the backwardness of the village folks is
an expression of the liberal urban values
he has imbibed but his conscientious self
is revealed in his sympathy for the girl,
who would otherwise, be condemned to a life
of spinsterhood, which makes him agree to
the proposal of marriage.
 The
second act is a love story that portrays
the evolution of Apu’s marriage with
Aparna - from their beginning as perfect
strangers, to the discovery of marital bliss,
Aparna’s pregnancy and the terrible
finale. Ray’s depiction of the charms
of intimacy in Apur Sansar stands
among the one of the restrained yet cinematically
imaginative explorations of the subject.
Like all masters Ray is able to overcome
the limits of cultural censorship into a
celebration of artistic allusion. The changes
of a curtain on a window in Apu’s
room become the signifier of the growth
of the Apu-Aparna conjugal life. In the
beginning of the film, rain pouring from
the torn curtain had disturbed Apu’s
sleep. In the scene of Aparna’s arrival
in the room, Ray in one memorable close-up
of her eyes framed through the same hole
observing a poor mother playing with her
infant, wonderfully captures her anxiety
and sadness of leaving a life of luxury
and starting a new life with a stranger.
But now the camera pulls back from a new
curtain to reveal the couple lying chastely
on the bed. Aparna wakes up and as she moves
away she discovers that her aanchal is tied
to Apu’s dhoti. She unties the knot,
gives Apu a playful smack and sets about
her daily chores. Apu wakes up, slowly turns
and gazes at her dreamily and contently
as she sets about lighting the chullah.
There is a silent exchange between them
as Apu picks out his pack of cigarettes
for his habitual morning smoke only to find
she has inserted a note to remind him of
his promise to restrict himself to a cigarette
after his meal. Next, he picks up a hairclip
that had slipped out of Aparna's hair during
the night and wistfully turns it around
between his fingers. The cigarette would
later feature as an index of intimacy –
Aparna would indulgently light up Apu’s
cigarette in a hackney-carriage which Apu,
in a flash of extravagance, had hired to
steal a moment of intimacy before she would
leave to give birth to their child in her
parents’ house. The ethereal glow
of the matchstick that lights up Aparna’s
face for a fleeting moment becomes the metaphor
of the transient nature of their happiness
– the slow fade out of the glow is
a subtle omen of the tragic future.
The manner in which Ray constructs the
shock of Aparna’s death (which occurs
off-screen) is another example of his ability
to capture intense emotions with extreme
subtlety. Apu’s rapture after managing
to finish reading a letter from Aparna following
three attempts in three different situations
is cruelly shattered by the terrible news
conveyed by his brother-in-law Murari whom
Apu assaults in a fit of anger and helplessness.
The third and the defining act of the film
focuses on the tragedy, its aftermath and
Apu’s reconciliation with his son
Kajol whom he had held responsible for the
death of his beloved. Ray’s portrayal
of Apu’s manic melancholy is one of
the cinematic highlights of Apur Sansar.
In a dialogueless sequence starting of a
series of same axis dissolves on Apu lying
passively on his bed, Ray depicts his transformation
from a handsome man to a dishevelled wreck.
A close-up of his face framed in a mirror
with the screech of a passing train in the
soundtrack captures his state of mind that
leads to his suicide attempt. The train,
which in earlier episodes of the trilogy
was a metaphor of hope and discovery now
becomes the terrible angel of death. As
the train approaches and Apu leans forward
to throw himself in front of the train,
a sudden squeal is heard. The camera then
reveals a dying pig which people rush in
to rescue – the spell of self-destruction
is shattered and Apu loses the courage the
take his own life. The montage sequence
that follows depicting Apu wandering around
the country seems to lack spontaneity although
the shot of the pages of his manuscript
– which Apu throws off from the edge
of a hill – symbolises his extreme
nihilism but the rousing background music
stands as an omen of a new beginning. Thus
when his friend Pulu – who is responsible
for all the major changes in Apu’s
life - comes to convince Apu that he needs
to see his son, now five years old, Apu
finally relents and goes back to Khulna.
The final sequences of the film involving
Kajol’s acceptance of Apu as his friend
(not father) eschews melodramatic excess.
The sequence of Kajol playing nonchalantly
with a dead bird which he had killed beautifully
portrays the innocent cruelty of a neglected
child. His throwing a stone at Apu superbly
captures the little child’s intense
pain and anger at his absent father. When
Apu first sees Kajol lying on the same bed
where he and Aparna had spend the first
night of their wedded life, the soundtrack
brings back the same bhatiali folk-song
that had drifted in on that memorable night,
as the index of Apu’s a change of
heart and his realisation that a part of
Aparna lives within little Kajol. The closing
shot of Apur Sansar where Kajol
accepts Apu as a friend who carries him
on his shoulders and walks towards the camera,
is a celebration of life. Ray freezes the
shot to indicate there are journeys still
to be made – major scars yet to be
healed - but there is hope. The final freeze
frame with its joyous music on the background
– a variation of the Apu-Aparna theme
that was used in the hackney carriage sequence
– thus becomes an ending that points
to the beginning of a new journey.
Apur Sansar has all the technical
brilliance that is the signature of Ray’s
major films. Subrata Mitra’s camerawork
is the ideal compliment to the director’s
lyrical vision while the art direction of
Bansi
Chandragupta is a landmark in the annals
of realistic cinema. The background music
composed by Pt. Ravi Shankar is never intrusive
but perfectly captures the myriad emotions
that the characters undergo. The expressive
use of non-synchronous sounds creates imageries
that go beyond the stunning visuals. The
acting and casting is of the highest calibre.
Soumitra
Chatterjee – who was to become
Ray’s favourite actor - in his debut
film gives a multi-dimensional portrayal;
it's easy to believe that he's the same
Apu that we got to know in the other two
films. Sharmila Tagore, who in Ray’s
own words "had appeared in a dance
recital for the Children's Little Theatre...She
was only thirteen years old but now looked
about four years older (in a red-striped
sari)" is exquisite as the young
bride who lights up Apu’s life. Swapan
Chakraborty is also perfect as the sensitive
yet pragmatic Pulu who acts as the catalyst
of change in various critical moments of
Apu’s life. Alok Chakraborty’s
performance as Kajol is yet another confirmation
of the director’s talent to extract
the very best from his child actors. The
casting and acting of the minor characters
too is excellent and extremely convincing.
Apur Sansar was hugely popular
with the Bengali audience, though Apu’s
slap on his brother-in-law Murari was heavily
criticised by some critics as a major deviation
from Bibhutibhushan’s gentle and compassionate
original. There were also grumblings about
Kajol playing with a dead bird – for
some this act of cruelty was unbecoming
of a child. Ray, confident of his stature
and ability as a filmmaker would dismiss
such carping as "absence of common
sense and the critic’s lack of proper
understanding of the novel itself"
and vigorously defend his cinematic trans-creation
to be faithful to the spirit of the original
novel.
Apur Sansar went on to win the
President’s Gold Medal as the best
feature film in 1959. The international
awards won by the film include Best Foreign
Film, National Board of Review of Motion
Pictures, USA (1960) and the Diploma of
Merit, 14th International Film Festival,
Edinburgh (1960).
Contributed by Monish K Das, an
alumnus of the Film and Television Institute
of India (FTII), Pune with specialization
in Film Editing, 1992. He now lives and
works as a documentary filmmaker and social
communication consultant in Kolkata.
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