"Actor: Soumitra Chatterjee"

• The Apu Trilogy (Criterion Collection) UK Only | Blu Ray | (25/05/2020) from £59.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Two decades after its original negatives were burned in a fire, Satyajit Ray's breathtaking milestone of world cinema rises from the ashes in a meticulously reconstructed new restoration. The Apu Trilogy brought India into the golden age of international art-house film, following one indelible character, a free-spirited child in rural Bengal who matures into an adolescent urban student and finally a sensitive man of the world. These delicate masterworks- Pather Panchali (Song of the Little Road), Aparajito (The Unvanquished), and Apur Sansar (The World of Apu)-based on two books by Bibhutibhusan Banerjee, were shot over the course of five years, and each stands on its own as a tender, visually radiant journey. They are among the most achingly beautiful, richly humane movies ever made-essential works for any film lover. Pather Panchali The release in 1955 of Satyajit Ray's debut, Pather Panchali, introduced to the world an eloquent and important new cinematic voice. A depiction of rural Bengali life in a style inspired by Italian neorealism, this naturalistic but poetic evocation of a number of years in the life of a family introduces us to both little Apu and, just as essentially, the women who will help shape him: his independent older sister, Durga; his harried mother, Sarbajaya, who, with her husband away, must hold the family together; and his kindly and mischievous elderly auntie, Indir-vivid, multifaceted characters all. With resplendent photography informed by its young protagonist's perpetual sense of discovery, the Cannes-awarded Pather Panchali is an immersive cinematic experience and a film of elemental power. Aparajito Satyajit Ray had not planned to make a sequel to Pather Panchali, but after the film's international success, he decided to continue Apu's narrative. Aparajito picks up where the first film leaves off, with Apu and his family having moved away from the country to live in the bustling holy city of Varanasi (then known as Benares). As Apu progresses from wide-eyed child to intellectually curious teenager, eventually studying in Kolkata, we witness his academic and moral education, as well as the growing complexity of his relationship with his mother. This tenderly expressive, often heart-wrenching film, which won three top prizes at the Venice Film Festival, including the Golden Lion, not only extends but also spiritually deepens the tale of Apu. Apur Sansar By the time Apur Sansar was released, Satyajit Ray had directed not only the first two Apu films but also the masterpiece The Music Room, and was well on his way to becoming a legend. This extraordinary final chapter brings our protagonist's journey full circle. Apu is now in his early twenties, out of college, and hoping to live as a writer. Alongside his professional ambitions, the film charts his romantic awakening, which occurs as the result of a most unlikely turn of events, and his eventual, fraught fatherhood. Featuring soon to be Ray regulars Soumitra Chatterjee and Sharmila Tagore in star-making performances, and demonstrating Ray's ever more impressive skills as a crafter of pure cinematic imagery, Apur Sansar is a moving conclusion to this monumental trilogy. Special Features: New 4K digital restorations of all three films, undertaken in collaboration with the Academy Film Archive at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and L'Immagine Ritrovata, with uncompressed monaural soundtracks on the Blu-rays Audio recordings from 1958 of director Satyajit Ray reading his essay A Long Time on the Little Road and in conversation with film historian Gideon Bachmann New interviews with actors Soumitra Chatterjee, Shampa Srivastava, and Sharmila Tagore; camera assistant Soumendu Roy; and film writer Ujjal Chakraborty New video essay by Ray biographer Andrew Robinson on the trilogy's evolution and production The Apu Trilogy : A Closer Look, a new program featuring filmmaker, producer, and teacher Mamoun Hassan Excerpts from the 2003 documentary The Song of the Little Road, featuring composer Ravi Shankar The Creative Person: Satyajit Ray, a 1967 half-hour documentary by James Beveridge, featuring interviews with Ray, several of his actors, members of his creative team, and film critic Chidananda Das Gupta Footage of Ray receiving an honorary Oscar in 1992 New program on the restorations by filmmaker :: kogonada New English subtitle translations PLUS: A booklet featuring essays by critics Terrence Rafferty and Girish Shambu

• Charulata (1964) (Criterion Collection) UK Only | Blu Ray | (05/04/2021) from £17.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  This film about a woman's artistic and romantic yearning by SATYAJIT RAY (The Music Room) is set in late nineteenth-century, pre-independence India. It takes place in the gracious home of a liberal-minded, workaholic newspaper editor and his lonely, stifled wife, Charulata (The Big City's MADHABI MUKHERJEE), whose exquisitely composed features mask a burning creativity. When her husband's poet cousin comes to stay with them, Charulata finds herself both inspired by him to pursue her own writing and dangerously drawn to him physically. Based on a novella by the great Rabindranath Tagore, Charulata is a work of subtle textures, a delicate tale of a marriage in jeopardy and a woman taking the first steps toward establishing her own voice. Special Features: New 2K digital film restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack New interview program with actors Madhabi Mukherjee and Soumitra Chatterjee Adapting Tagore, a new interview program featuring Indian film scholar Moinak Biswas and Bengali literature historian Supriya Chaudhuri Archival audio interview with director Satyajit Ray by film historian Gideon Bachmann New English subtitle translation PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by critic Philip Kemp and a 1980s interview with Ray by his biographer Andrew Robinson

• Devi (1960) (AKA The Goddess) (Criterion Collection) UK Only | Blu Ray | (22/11/2021) from £19.98   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Master filmmaker Satyajit Ray (The Apu Trilogy) explores the conflict between fanaticism and free will in Devi (The Goddess), issuing a subversively modern challenge to religious orthodoxy and patriarchal power structures. In the waning days of mid-nineteenth-century India's feudal system, after his son (Apur Sansar's Soumitra Chatterjee) leaves for Kolkata to complete his studies, a wealthy rural landowner (The Music Room's Chhabi Biswas) is seized by the notion that his beloved daughter-in-law (The Hero's hauntingly sad-eyed Sharmila Tagore) is the reincarnation of the goddess Kalia delusion that proves devastating to the young woman and those around her. The opulently stylized compositions and the chiaroscuro lighting by cinematographer Subrata Mitra (Charulata) heighten the entrancing expressionistic intensity of this domestic tragedy, making for an experience that is both sublime and shattering. Bonus Features 4K digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack Interviews with actors Sharmila Tagore and Soumitra Chatterjee, recorded in 2013 Video essay by film scholar Meheli Sen English subtitle translation PLUS: An essay by film critic Devika Girish

• Devi Goddess | DVD | (14/09/2009) from £3.07   |  Saving you £8.18 (451.93%)   |  RRP £9.99

  In Goddess (aka: Devi) Doyamoyee is left alone with her husband's ageing father-in-law a devoted follower of the goddess Kali. One evening the aging widower she cares for has a dream that she is an avatar of Kali and must be worshipped. Word spreads and others come to believe that she is an incarnation of the deity. Hearing this alarming news her husband Umprasad returns only to find Doyamoyee herself beginning to believe that she is an avatar; a belief which soon turns to tragedy.

• Abhijan | DVD | (29/05/2006) from £20.24   |  Saving you £-0.25 (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Abhijan was Satyajit Ray's most popular film in Bengal: a ""conscious"" effort to communicate with a wider audience. The project was originally conceived by his friends and Ray stepped in when they panicked at the prospect of directing. Ray's mastery turned a starkly conventional plot into a subtly nuanced story which topped the Bengali box office for months. Set on the Bihar-Bengal border where Marwari businessmen - a powerful Hindi-dialect community of entrepreneurs much disl

• Satyajit Ray Collection Vol.1 | DVD | (25/08/2008) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £29.99

  Satyajit Ray is internationally acknowledged as one of the great masters of world cinema. His films - many of them masterpieces - have won him legions of admirers among them Akira Kurosawa Henri Cartier-Bresson V.S. Naipaul and Martin Scorsese. This box set features the following films: Mahanagar (Aka: The Big City) (1963): Set in the mid '50s Ray's often humorous story of conflicting social values in India's lower-middle class stars Madhabi Mukherjee as a housewife whose growing independence alarms her traditionalist India 1963 family. Charulata (Aka: The Lonely Wife) (1964): Neglected by her ambitious journalist husband the lonely Charulata (Madhabi Mukherjee) befriends his cousin (Soumitra Chatterjee) a sensitive aspiring writer and almost inevitably their feelings for each other begin to deepen. Adapted from a story by Rabindranath Tagore Ray considered this sesnitively realised drama one of his finest achievements. Nayak (Aka: The Hero) (1966): This beautifully observed character study was one of Ray's earliest original screenplays. En route to an award ceremony a famous and egocentric Bengali movie star finds that he is compelled to re-evaluate his life after encountering a disapproving young journalist (Sharmila Tagore).

• Two Daughters | DVD | (14/09/2009) from £9.49   |  Saving you £3.50 (26.90%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Two Daughters (aka: Teen Kanya) tells two tales. The first is about Nanda a young man who leaves Calcutta to work as a postmaster in an isolated malaria-infested village. His only solace in the village is in teaching his host Ratan how to read and write. The second story is about a student Amulya who returns to his village after finishing his exams. His widowed mother is very anxious for him to marry and has already picked out a girl. Yet he rejects his mother's choice and being forced to choose some girl marries a lively tomboy who is not ready to give up her freedom.

• The Satyjit Ray Collection Vol.2 | DVD | (22/09/2008) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £29.99

  Satyajit Ray's artistic legacy is one of the most formidable in all of film history. Exceptionally versatile his films covered almost every conceivable genre winning him nearly every major cinema award including an Oscar for lifetime achievement. Titles Comprise: Kapurush (a.k.a The Coward) (1965): Stranded in a small town screenwriter Amitabha Roy is astonished to encounter a former lover who is now married to the owner of a tea plantation. Recalling his inability to commit to her and the relationship's resultant breakdown Roy decides to make amends for the past. Mahapurush (a.k.a The Holy Man) (1965): Ray's rarely-seen gem is a comedy-drama in which a gullible and religiously devout retiree is completely taken in by a bogus holy man and enlists the charlatan's help in finding his daughter a husband. But she is being courted by a young man who determines to expose the fraudster. Joi Baba Felunath (1978): Set in the holy city of Benares where Ray had shot Aparajito over 20 years previously this adventure story adapted from Ray's own novel stars Soumitra Chatterjee as a detective investigating the theft of a priceless gold icon.

• Charulata | DVD | (24/06/2013) from £21.58   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

• Charulata | Blu Ray | (26/08/2013) from £26.98   |  Saving you £-6.99 (-35.00%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Neglected by her ambitious journalist husband the lonely Charulata befriends his cousin a sensitive aspiring writer and almost inevitably their feelings for each other begin to deepen. Adapted from a story by Rabindranath Tagore Ray considered this sensitively realised drama one of his finest achievements.

• Charulata | DVD | (17/04/2006) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £13.99

  Charu lives a lonely and idle life in 1870s India. Although her husband devotes more time to his newspaper than to their marriage he sees her loneliness and asks his brother-in-law Umapeda a would-be writer to keep her company. At this point Bhupati's cousin Amal visits and spends a long vacation and after several months Charu and Amal's feelings for each other move beyond friendship.

• Mahapurush | DVD | (17/04/2006) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £13.99

  Ever since the death of his wife Gurupada Mitter advocate has been going through a state of deep mental unrest. On his way back from Benaras he encounters Birinchi - a Babaji who claims to be ageless. Gurtupada becomes his disciple. Gurupada's daughter Buchki is disappointed with her lover Satya and in order to teach him a lesson becomes a disciple of Birinchi. Satya seeing his romance in jeopardy takes the help of his friend Nibaran and they both decide to expose the fraud Birinchi in front of his Police devotees. In the process he also exposes the foolishness of the devotees who make it possible for swindlers like Birinchi to establish themselves as saints and prophets.

• Kapurush | DVD | (07/08/2006) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £13.99

  On his way to Hanshimara to collect material for a film story Amitabha Roy's taxi has a breakdown and he is offered hospitality for the night by Bimal Gupta a local tree planter. Bimal's wife Karuna turns out to be Amitabha's one time love. In the course of the evening Amitabha realizes that Bimal and Karuna's marriage cannot be a happy one. Amitabha even wants to take Karuna away and atone for his past betrayal. But Karuna refuses. Next morning they plan to go out on a picnic but Bimal falls asleep and the plan gets bungled. Amitabha scrawls a hasty note to Karuna that he will wait for her in the station. Amitabha waits till the last minute only to see Karuna come to the station asking for her phial of sleeping tablets.

• Joi Baba Felunath | DVD | (03/03/2008) from £12.38   |  Saving you £-6.39 (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

  Joi Baba Felunathinvolves a detective-who is away on a holiday and is called into action when a priceless artefact is stolen.

• 15 Park Avenue | DVD | (22/05/2006) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  15 Park Avenue