Synopsis
Four young men in their late 20s take off
from the city of Calcutta on a car to let
down their hair in the wilderness of a forest
town in Bihar. Bubbling with over confidence
and arrogance, their attempt at severing
all communications with ‘civilization’,
however, meets with some accidents, some
happy and some not so happy when they interact
with the locals and the female members of
a family that have also come to the forest
town for vacation. The poise and the self-assurance
of the four friends peel off gradually as
they are caught on the wrong foot by the
female characters on a number of occasions,
who bail them out, and the friends are forced
to look at themselves in a new light. It
is like a rites of passage for them as they
are forced to come to terms with their shortcomings
and by the time they drive back to the city,
they are no longer the same.
The film
When Aranyer Din Ratri was first
released in Calcutta in 1969, it was reported
that the viewers were put off by the seemingly
random flow of events and kept looking for
a ‘story’ that would bind all
the incidents together. Ray
rued in an interview in Sight & Sound,
“… the film is about so
many things, that's the trouble. People
want just one theme, which they can hold
in their hands."
He likened the structure of the film to
a fugue, in which different elements appear
and reappear developed, interwoven, transformed,
and subtly balanced against each other.
He had applied the same technique in an
earlier film of his called Kanchanjunga
(1962) where a set of familiar characters
are pitted against each other in unfamiliar
surroundings within a tight span of time
and are forced to look at themselves as
they interact with each other. It is a very
familiar premise in world cinema that finds
its manifestations in classics like Jean
Renoir’s Rules of the Game (1939),
one of Ray’s favourites or Roman Polanski’s
Knife in the Water (1962) to name
a few.
 At
a surface level the film is very light-hearted.
But below it seethes with tensions and cross
currents that reflects an extremely complex
pattern and intrigue and clash of egos.
Ashim (played by Ray’s favourite actor
Soumitra
Chatterjee), the most affluent and assured
of the young men, is attracted to the poised
and intelligent Mini (Sharmila Tagore).
Jaya (Kaberi Bose), the young widow, tries
to seduce the shy and hypocritical Sanjoy
(Subhendu
Chatterjee) but the labour welfare officer
fails to live up to her expectations and
fails to perform. Hari (Samit Bhanja), the
handsome but blunt sportsman, seduces a
Santhali woman, Duli (played by Simi Garewal),
and is badly beaten by one of her fellow-villagers
whom he had earlier beaten on the false
charges of stealing his purse. Sekhar (another
of Ray's favourite actors, the roly-poly
Robi Ghosh) gambles compulsively and plays
the fool. While all of them are engaged
in their respective pursuits, they fail
or refuse to take notice of the bungalow
caretaker’s wife who is seriously
ill at their backyard. It is left to the
sensitive and beautiful Mini to point this
out to Ashim who does not quite like the
poignant reminder of a world that he does
now want to keep link with except when he
wants it for his own selfish interests.
In an earlier sequence of the film, he had
brow beaten the character into accepting
a bribe so that they could occupy his bungalow
and had exclaimed in English, “Thank
god for corruption.” In fact,
one of the overriding themes of the film
is the clash of polarities as represented
by the urban and the rural; the rich and
the poor; the sophisticated and the tribal;
the corrupt and the innocent. But Ray, being
the compassionate master that he is, refers
to the theme obliquely, in swift and deft
brush strokes and does not address it as
an agenda like the so-called art filmmakers
of the 70s who made an issue out of it.
It stays at the level of subtext. We retain
our sympathies with the characters despite
their double standards and narrow mindedness;
the characters come across as rounded and
believable, and a reflection of ourselves
maybe in many cases.
Like in most Ray films, the female characters
come across as more sensitive and intelligent
and a moral touchstone that brings the male
characters into sharp relief and puts them
in their place as they are forced to look
at themselves in a new light, often humiliating.
The sophisticated Sharmila Tagore with her
cool and intelligent screen persona often
fulfilled this role in many of Ray’s
films like Nayak (1966) and Seemabaddha
(1971) as she does in this film.
This Ray classic is replete with memorable
scenes that have been written by Ray himself
as he did all his films. Within 5 minutes
of the beginning before the credits roll,
all the four major characters are introduced
as they drive in Ashim’s car through
the jungles of Bihar. It is the amongst
the most brilliant exposition of characters
through swift exchanges of dialogues and
small actions that set the characters from
each other in terms of their likes and orientations
and social and economic positions and acts
as a subtle indicator of what is to come.
No discussion of the film would be complete
without the memory game sequence that is
played out by the six major characters.
Each player has to choose the name of a
famous person and also remember, in sequence,
all the previous choices. Subtle and elegantly
structured, each character reveals himself
or herself in the way he or she plays. Ray’s
mastery of the misce-en-scene comes out
in full steam as he cuts between the different
characters and tracks from character to
character as they engage in this wonderful
game that throbs with sexual undercurrents.
It is a brilliant piece of cinema played
out in a surefire style and marks him out
amongst the masters of world cinema.
Mention must also be made of the wonderful
cross cutting sequence towards the end of
the film when all the four male characters
are engaged in their respective pursuits.
With a tribal fair as its central setting,
the director intercuts between the different
sets of characters: Ashim trying to forge
a relationship with Mini; the voluptuous
Jaya trying to seduce Sanjay; Hari running
amongst the wilderness with the svelte and
dusky tribal girl before they end up making
love under the trees and Sekhar gambling
away with borrowed money. The entire sequence
is interspersed with shots of tribal women
dancing to primitive rhythm as the central
characters are engaged in their primitive
pursuits. It is another piece of beautiful
cinema that raises the film to extraordinary
levels of artistic expression as the music
rises to a crescendo.
Bansi Chandragupta’s re-construction
of the interiors of the forest bungalow
and the country liquor shop and recreation
of the tribal fair are other highlights
of the film that point to a superb craftsmanship
in the annals of realistic cinema. His teaming
with Ray was a winning companionship that
is sorely missed in Ray’s last films
after Bansi’s death.
This is a film of extraordinary subtlety,
refinement and depth. A classic of world
cinema by one of the cinema's greatest directors,
it continues to impact viewers over different
generations.
Contributed by Ranjan Das, an alumnus
of the Film and Television Institute of
India (FTII), Pune with specialization in
Film Editing 1992. Having edited various
documentaries and directed different programmes
for Bengali Television, he has also written
for the popular TV serials Sidhhant,
Crime Patrol and Rihayee.
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