I watched this movie on a recommendation from YouTube channel Be Kind Rewind. A Bengali language film recommendation seemed to come out of left field. And one I had never heard of, on top of that.
I haven't watched many classic Bengali films despite my Bengali heritage. Or rather, I have been exposed to classic Bengali films when my grandmother used to watch them, I just didn't pay attention because my child brain would get bored. But I can appreciate them as an adult. In fact, these films are pretty much my only avenue for getting a glimpse of the world in which my grandmothers lived.
Both of my grandmothers worked; but they worked as schoolteachers, which would have been less controversial than a job as a sales rep. Neither of my grandmothers had to live with their in-laws because so they didn't have to face disapproval for challenging tradition ever so slightly. But my grandmothers did live in a world where a woman with agency was a dangerous thing, a woman with agency was a sign of indecency, where women of polite society were hesitant about owning their agency and shared their agency with their husbands and their elders.
To be honest, witnessing the gender roles and the expectations from the genders make me really upset. And I can't even try to distance myself and watch as a distant observer because I know that this would have been my life had I been born two generations earlier. The gulf has grown just too wide.
And that's what makes this an excellent film. It transported me to the 1960s. It transported me to the world in which my grandmothers grew up. With a masterfully crafted script and superb acting, it felt like I was watching the lives of real people who were my grandparents' contemporaries.
I was also surprised by how well the female protagonist was written and how deftly women's issues were portrayed. And this is because I do have a little bit of familiarity with Satyajit Ray. I've read some of his work and watched at least one of his movies, and he hardly ever featured female characters. I had assumed perhaps he didn't know how to handle female characters, but I clearly assumed wrong. The man is a masterful filmmaker and I have renewed respect for him.
I haven't watched many classic Bengali films despite my Bengali heritage. Or rather, I have been exposed to classic Bengali films when my grandmother used to watch them, I just didn't pay attention because my child brain would get bored. But I can appreciate them as an adult. In fact, these films are pretty much my only avenue for getting a glimpse of the world in which my grandmothers lived.
Both of my grandmothers worked; but they worked as schoolteachers, which would have been less controversial than a job as a sales rep. Neither of my grandmothers had to live with their in-laws because so they didn't have to face disapproval for challenging tradition ever so slightly. But my grandmothers did live in a world where a woman with agency was a dangerous thing, a woman with agency was a sign of indecency, where women of polite society were hesitant about owning their agency and shared their agency with their husbands and their elders.
To be honest, witnessing the gender roles and the expectations from the genders make me really upset. And I can't even try to distance myself and watch as a distant observer because I know that this would have been my life had I been born two generations earlier. The gulf has grown just too wide.
And that's what makes this an excellent film. It transported me to the 1960s. It transported me to the world in which my grandmothers grew up. With a masterfully crafted script and superb acting, it felt like I was watching the lives of real people who were my grandparents' contemporaries.
I was also surprised by how well the female protagonist was written and how deftly women's issues were portrayed. And this is because I do have a little bit of familiarity with Satyajit Ray. I've read some of his work and watched at least one of his movies, and he hardly ever featured female characters. I had assumed perhaps he didn't know how to handle female characters, but I clearly assumed wrong. The man is a masterful filmmaker and I have renewed respect for him.