Satyajit Ray. He’s much more than just the Apu trilogy as recent viewings of Charulata, The Big City and The Music Room have proven. Ray’s case is he is a Mount Rushmore realist (along with Rossellini, De Sica and perhaps the Dardenne brothers or Kiarostami at this point but that 4th is a good debate) with an impressive 5 top 500 films. If I ever fully come around on the Apu trilogy (I have all three outside my top 300) he may shoot even farther up this list.
Best film: The Music Room. I think Ray unquestionably improved as a director between the first two legs of the Apu trilogy and this masterpiece in 1958. Formally this is a behemoth—repetition of the chandelier, shots of Chhabi Biswas sitting—marvelous. If you could only see one Ray film I would start here.
total archiveable films: 8
top 100 films: 0
top 500 films: 5 (The Music Room, Pather Panchali, Aparajito, Charulata, The World of Apu)
top 100 films of the decade: 5 (The Music Room, Pather Panchali, Aparajito, Charulata, The World of Apu)
most overrated: Pather Panchali is a great film but the TSPDT consensus has it at #55 and I’m at #324 so that’s a sizeable disconnect. I actually really liked the film but you need to see the 2nd and 3rd film to have the full effect.
most underrated: Aparajito is #577 on TSPDT. This is just as good as the opening film and it’s over 500 spots lower for some reason. This trilogy is like the original Boyhood except it starts from birth and goes until he’s much older. Ray finds the exceptional in the ordinary and even if the films make you feel a little bombarded with situational drama problems it is a worthy work of art. It even has some postmodernism working here as Ray is writing about himself as Apu in many ways.
gem I want to spotlight: Charulata. Among Satyajit Ray’s best work- a meditation on passions, politics, romance and writing. More leisurely paced than most of Ray’s work. Brilliant shot of camera attached to a swing to capture Madhabi Mukherjee’s face- this would be picked up by others including Truffaut and Wes Anderson (GrandBudapest). The three leads are all brilliant but Madhabi Mukherjee in particular gives a spectacular performance- there’s countless examples but there’s a great moment when she realizes that she loves her cousin-in-law and she is in trouble. Her husband has a similar moment when he realizes that and the cousin-in-law’s has a moment of clarity surrounding his love of Charulata as well. A meditation on unrealized love. The finale is justifiably famous. It’s a series of freeze frames of open hands. It’s up there with (and of course echoes the 400 Blows. Wonderful sequences of the way Ray shoots Charulata eavesdropping on her husband telling her crush to get married. The husband is annoying sensible and virtuous- the side story of the betrayal of money on the husband makes it harder on Charulata and cousin-in-law. A long gorgeous tracking shot going up from the ground to Charulata’s unblinking eye which turns into a long dissolve montage mix of her getting ideas to write her great article. The film doesn’t have the devastating form and symmetry of The Music Room. Ray does his own music—which is wonderful and re-used in Darjeeling Limited. The subtle tracking shots of Charulata walking around her house is so nuanced in the editing- it’s almost like a Bresson film.. Mindless card game for 5 minutes to show her life and boredom— she’s a prisoner in her chic house with elegant wall-paper and décor- even has her opera glasses to look out. Must-See film- top 5 of the year quality after one viewing
stylistic innovations/traits: Ray has a very relaxed style and as I said above is a major figure in the history of cinematic realism. The simplistic style and the fact that the early version of neorealism (extraordinary things happening to ordinary people seems just like modern day drama but a poignant, well-earned drama). It’s impossible to deny thought that Apu is one of the most memorable characters in film history. His camera is observational and nuanced. That said—there are some moments of transcendent splash in Ray’s oeuvre like the dollies in The Music Room and the freeze frame finale in Charulata. As I said above The Music Room is one of the 25-50 strongest examples of film form— a devastating reoccurrence of images and symmetry.
top 10
- The Music Room
- Pather Panchali
- Aparajito
- Charulata
- The World of Apu
- The Big City
- Distant Thunder
- The Home and the World
By year and grades
| 1955- Pather Panchali | MS |
| 1956- Aparajto | MS |
| 1958- The Music Room | MP |
| 1959- The World of Apu | MS |
| 1963- The Big City | R |
| 1964- Charulata | MS |
| 1973- Distant Thunder | |
| 1984- The Home and the World |
*MP is Masterpiece- top 1-3 quality of the year film
MS is Must-see- top 5-6 quality of the year film
HR is Highly Recommend- top 10 quality of the year film
R is Recommend- outside the top 10 of the year quality film but still in the archives
@Drake- Have you seen any Ritwik Ghatak films? A contemporary of Satyajit Ray. Both Bengali filmmakers. 2 of Ghatak’s films are in the TSPDT 1000 Greatest films of all time list. The Cloud-Capped Star (1960) and Subarnarekha (1965). Madhumati (1958) is highly regarded and influential also. Ghatak didn’t direct it but he wrote the story and screenplay. This one is a Hindi film.
Jalsaghar is a much better name for Ray’s 1958 masterpiece than The Music Room.
@Anderson – why?
@Harry- It’s the real name and mysterious and short compared to the obvious English name.
It’s only 3 letters shorter and it’s a mouthful to pronounce in comparison. Unlike Devi.
Attenborough is an amazing actor. He was an in and out star for more than two decades (between 1948’s Brighton Rock and 1971’s 10 Rilllington Place). And worked with iconic directors as a character actor before (David Lean- In Which We Serve, Powell & Pressburger- A Matter of Life and Death) and after (Satyajit Ray- Shatranj Ke Khilari, Steven Spielberg- Jurassic Park: with like a 15 year gap focusing on directing and stopping acting) in this time period as well. All in all he had a long and successful acting career (56 years between In Which We Serve and Elizabeth).
His acting style has a lot of similarities with one of his contemporaries and one-time co-star in a weak film I think (Boys in Brown) and later director-star (A Bridge Too Far) Dirk Bogarde as well. And you can imagine Attenborough performing admirably in some of the top Bogarde film roles like The Servant and Death in Venice among others. Which is a compliment to both. Attenborough was bigger being younger when they were young starlets in the late 40’s but Bogarde was more dashing, taller and aged much better (Attenborough already had a receding hairline in his early 40’s) which led to him consistently getting top roles unlike Attenborough.
Attenborough’s best roles I have seen are Brighton Rock, The Ship That Died of Shame (very underrated), Guns at Batasi, and 10 Rillington Place. Although he is quite strong in Dunkirk (especially in the first half) and All Night Long (Amazing film!) as well. And I am yet to see The Angry Silence which got a Screenplay nom at the Oscars. And I need to take a look at Seance on a Wet Afternoon as well (Co-star Oscar nominated here).
Attenborough in general played timid, soft spoken characters but could have a dark edge and be extremely creepy as well (The Ship That Died of Shame, 10 Rillington Place). His role in Guns at Batasi is essential (set during African colonial wars) and so against type it takes a while to get on his wavelength. Loud, strict, dominating and brilliant. You cannot talk about Attenborough without seeing this film. And it is easy to see why he won the BAFTA for it. All in all, Richard Attenborough is one of the most talented actors ever!!!
@Anderson – I liked him in All Night Long. There was a good gradual transition from the confident party showman running the room, connecting with everyone to his regretful solo exit from the party. Looking forward to watching The Ship That Died of Shame.
@Harry- This is a smaller role for Attenborough. But still a very complex role. He is like a guest star in this. It is McGoohan’s film. Also a standout in Life For Ruth that same year for Dearden.
@Harry- And yeah The Ship That Died of Shame is a continuation of the same themes of friendship explored in The Blue Lamp and Pool of London. But by each and every film the lines between good and bad gets blurrier and blurrier. Rather than a clear divide like in The Blue Lamp. In the Blue Lamp both friends are innocent, in the Pool of London one gets involved with the bad people (Regular Ken Russell collaborator Max Adrian is great here), in the Ship That Died of Shame both friends get involved with the bad people. A continuation of this can also be found in A Place to Go but it does not follow through after the botched heist with the thriller elements like the other three. Also, this is a similar concept to The League of Gentlemen as a group of friends tries to bring back the juice and nostalgia of the good times when they were working for the British army in WW2 because in their current state they are down on their luck and unsatisfied.
@Anderson – The Blue Lamp is very strong. I’m four films down now with Dearden and excited to get to the two boat ones.
@Harry- Pool of London is not a boat film really. There is a very small section where Bonar Colleano travels on a boat but other than it’s set on land or the docked ship. It’s premise is similar to
Cinderella Liberty.
@Harry- Yeah. The Blue Lamp is a strong film. Did you catch the bookend with the pan to the lamp? There is a very strong split diopter in the heist scene. This film was the biggest film in Britain in 1950. The success of this was so big, Jack Warner was made an honorary policeman and when he died his funeral service was conducted by the police. He also reprised this role for a show that ran on Television for 22 Seasons!!!
Warner, Jimmy Hanley (and Gladys Henson) was also in The Captive Heart in 1946 (a strong WW2 Prison drama led by real-life couple
Michael Redgrave and Rachel Kempson). And they are as strong if not better than they were here (especially
Hanley) in that film.
To add to Pool of London, it has some strong shadowy silhouette photography.
@Drake- Have you seen Ray’s The Chess Players[Shatranj Ke Khiladi](1977)?
@Drake- Do you have any Ashutosh Gowariker films in the archives?
I’ve now seen the whole of the Apu trilogy as well as The Music Room, and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t underwhelmed.
At any rate I agree that The Music Room is his best film out of those four, and I agree with your initial assessment that Aparajito is underrated in relation to Pather Panchali (I think it’s a noticeable improvement visually, actually), so I’m surprised you went back on that opinion and finally have them so far apart just like TSPDT in your new ranking. I think the gap with World of Apu is right, clearly the weak bit of the trilogy formally (and even writing wise), but yeah Aparajito and Pather Panchali looked quite close to my eyes.
As a whole though, I couldn’t help but feel I was watching a downgraded version of De Sica in an exotic setting all throughout my time with these films. In the Apu films especially, while there are consistent nice frames with obstruction (but rarely jaw dropping ones) all throughout, the editing was pretty clumsy I’d say. A lot of cuts are abrupt and/or flow weirdly from one another, although I remember a couple of nice transition at times, one with the birds at the beginning of Aparajito and a close up of Apu crying fading into the same face lying down in an apathetic manner after time has passed in World of Apu. Pather Panchali was a while ago so I don’t have fresh examples in mind unfortunately.
And going full subjective enjoyment factor as a final note, I was excruciatingly bored during all these watches. And that’s coming from an Antonioni, Tarr, Dreyer and Jeanne Dielman fan lol. 90 minutes felt like a sluggish 4 hours. Still, I’ll try and give a chance to Devi and Charulata soon, but I doubt I’ll be able to push through beyond them if it’s the same kind of experience.
Actual final note: The trilogy is painted as this precursor to Boyhood but for a neorealist work I felt it took a LOT of easy melodrama tropes, to my dismay, and ironically Truffaut’s, who initially hated Pather Panchali for the trivia, Antoine Doinel felt a lot more grounded and credible despite not going for that school of cinema at all.
@Vaanilla- Thanks for sharing here- and good for you for crossing this one off your list
A question and a comment.
Have you seen Nayak/The Hero, Kapurush and/or Days and Nights in the Forest? In my opinion, overlooked Ray films that are well worth watching. Nayak is kind of his 8 1/2, while Days and Nights in the Forest feels like a 21st century indie dramedy decades before its time.
Re: stylistic innovation, I think it’s important to note that cinematographer Subrata Mitra pioneered the use of bounce lighting during the production of the Apu Trilogy, adding another tool to the cinematographer’s arsenal. I believe that Aparajito is the first use of bounce lighting in film history.
Hey Drake, what would you consider to be your top 10 debut films? Would Ray make it on the list with Pather Panchali?
@Gohan- Updating the top 500 list as we speak – but for now (at least for the next few weeks) going down this would be a good way to do it https://thecinemaarchives.com/2019/04/10/the-best-500-films-of-all-time/ and then in 2018 I put this together https://thecinemaarchives.com/2018/11/26/best-debuts-of-the-21st-century/
Do you still have the 10-year moratorium thing? If yes from what year onwards are films ineligible? 2014?
@Malith- 2013 will be included but not 2014
Not Drake but I think I’d put it at #1, or maybe in a 1A/1B situation with Citizen Kane.
Love your blog, interested in the comment on stylistic innovations/traits, would love a list on the 25-50 strongest examples of film form.
@Dennis- Thanks for the comment on the website and for visiting the site. I’ve compiled a few here- but you can search just throwing “film form” in the search bar and see what pages/reviews it comes up on.
https://thecinemaarchives.com/2018/09/19/the-searchers-1956-ford/
https://thecinemaarchives.com/2019/04/02/peppermint-candy-1999-chang-dong-lee/
https://thecinemaarchives.com/2019/03/25/in-the-mood-for-love-2000-kar-wai-wong/
https://thecinemaarchives.com/2020/03/26/mon-oncle-damerique-1980-resnais/
https://thecinemaarchives.com/2020/12/22/teorema-1968-pasolini/
https://thecinemaarchives.com/2020/12/30/the-assistant-2019-green/
https://thecinemaarchives.com/2021/06/14/the-music-room-1958-satyajit-ray/
My ranking of Ray`s films that I`ve seen:
1. The Music Room MP
2. Pather Panchali MP
3. Charulata MS/MP
4. Aparajito MS
5. Apur Sansar MS
6. The Goddess MS (it could go higher)
Hello Drake. How many Ray films do you have in the archives now? Were there any big surprises?
What are you watching these days. Director study?
@AP- Finished the Ray study not too long ago- great fun. I now have 16 Ray films in the archives. That stretch of work between 1955-1964 is especially strong. The Goddess (1960) also known as Devi was a very nice surprise. I am in the middle of a Seijun Suzuki and a Park Chan-wook study currently. I finished up a little Randolph Scott marathon (rare to do an actor but was fun to catch some more westerns before the summer ended) and then a fair amount of both new and random stuff as it comes along.
@Drake – what did you think of The Goddess (Devi), Tokyo Drifter, Branded to Kill? I was able to catch all 3 last week and was very impressed. Still mulling their grades over but considering HR/MS.
@LeBron Smith- Yes, very strong. All three will on the top 1000 when I update the top 500 and expand it to 1000.
@Drake – Awesome to hear. Did you come across any other films by Ray or Suzuki that were at the same level or close to the same level as those three? Looking to add some things to my watchlist haha
@LeBron Smith – Gate of Flesh (1964) is right there for Suzuki. For Ray, it is his Apu trilogy, The Music Room, Charulata, and The Goddess at the top.
Hi Drake, do you have a list of all the Satyajit Ray films you have archived? I’m embarking on my own study and am only realising now how deep his filmography is.
@DeclanG- here’s what I have- mind the spelling errors and the like- this wasn’t vetted… I’ve seen 20 films of his in the last 10 years or so- I think I’ve archived them all- there are just a few films I’ve seen twice in that stretch
1955- Pather Panchali MP
1956- Aparajto MS
1958- The Music Room MP
1959- The World of Apu MS
1960- Devi MS
1961- Three Daughters R/HR
1962- The Expedition R
1963- Mahanagar HR
1964- Charulata MP
1965- The Coward R/HR
1966- Nayak: The Hero HR
1967- The Zoo R
1973- Distant Thunder
1977- The Chess Players R
1979- The Elephant God R
1984- The Home and the World R
Where do you have Richard Attenborough on your all-time great actors list?
@Drake- Where do you have Richard Attenborough on your all-time great actors list?
@Drake – That’s such an impressive jump from what you had on this page.
On the topic of the cinema of India, I watched Anurag Kashyap’s Gangs of Wasseypur earlier this year and it is loaded with cinematic style for five hours. Recommend this to anyone here.
Okay, maybe you won’t answer me, but could you put the 25-50 strongest examples of film form please, the form is the most difficult thing to understand
@Aldo, In the mood for love is great. It has nice form and some good repetition with images/soundtrack etc. The stylistic elements are good and ties in well with the narrative.
What are some of your favorite films with good form @Aldo?
This is one of the first that comes to mind, thanks @Azman. I have no idea haha, what would be your favorites?
Thanks for your answers Drake, it is very useful.
@Aldo, i don’t have a list of good film form movies, however, In the Mood for Love is the usually the 1st movie that comes to my mind. High Noon is well structured, conventional narrative with some nice repetition of the clock images(I mention it because I saw it recently). I’ll really have to think about this to make a proper list. @Drake, what are 3-5 movies you sometimes think of when you hear good film form being mentioned?
@Aldo, You’ll get a clearer understanding of form once you watch In the Mood For Love and once you read David Bordwell’s articles(as Drake’s mentions). Have you seen In the Mood For Love? If not, I really recommend you do.
Yes, I have seen it, but even so, would I recognize a movie with a good form?
@Aldo – Azman is quite right with In the Mood For Love. I’d encourage you to read as much from David Bordwell on film form. Ozu’s Tokyo Story has great formal construction (look for his use of cutaways or “pillow shots”). I think you should seek out the work of Jim Jarmusch as well- particularly Stranger Than Paradise. Roy Anderrson’s work. The Master. Punch Drunk Love. Y Tu Mama Tambien.
@Aldo, of course you could recognize a film with good form even with watching Wong kar Wai’s masterpiece. However, its essential viewing if you like film form and it may be the best example of film form in the medium’s 100+ year history.
If you want to know what film form is, I strongly suggest reading articles (especially the ones Drake linked).
It is many things such as repetition, style with the narrative etc. If you still have any questions about what form is after reading online articles, feel free to ask me, I will be happy to help you.??
@AP– Great. I haven’t seen it. I look forward to catching up with it.
Shatranj ke Khilari (1977) is up there with anything made by Ray. Think it will make his top 5, actually. His first major Hindi film, and the ensemble is very strong as well.