Satyajit Ray Films

Although best known for his The Apu Trilogy, Satyajit Ray created a body of work as diverse as his own talents, which included graphic design, fiction and composing music. In 1948, he helped form Calcutta’s first film club, which introduced him to Jean Renoir as he scouted locations for The River; a subsequent viewing of Bicycle Thieves cemented... show more >

Although best known for his The Apu Trilogy, Satyajit Ray created a body of work as diverse as his own talents, which included graphic design, fiction and composing music. In 1948, he helped form Calcutta’s first film club, which introduced him to Jean Renoir as he scouted locations for The River; a subsequent viewing of Bicycle Thieves cemented his filmmaking aspirations and Pather Panchali was a direct result. That Bengali film’s close observation and subtle storytelling stood apart from Hindi cinema’s outlandish musical melodramas, and Ray became identified with a more realist and thematically ambitious Indian cinema.

He soon impressed with films in other modes: the meditative parable Jalsaghar, the profound Victorian love triangle Charulata (see Satyajit Ray Volume 1), and the observational and satirical shorts Kapurush and Mahapurush (see Satyajit Ray Volume 2). Throughout, Ray’s literary sense of multilayered stories and complex characters remained a defining characteristic. His cinema is a nourishing fountain of human observation and insight. < show less