| Aparajito (The Unvanquished), 1956 |
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| Apu, on the bank of the Ganges,performs the obligatory rituals after his father's death. |
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Production: Epic Films |
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Screenplay and Direction: Satyajit Ray |
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Based on a novel by Bibhutibhusan Bandyopadhyay |
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Music: Ravi Shankar |
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Photography: Subrata Mitra |
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Art Director: Bansi Chandragupta |
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Editing: Dulal Dutta |
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Sound: Durgadas Mitra |
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Duration: 113 mins |
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Date of release in India: 11th October 1956. B&W |
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Cast: Kanu Banerjee (Harihar), Karuna Banerjee (Sarbajaya), Pinaki Sengupta(Apu as a little boy), Smaran Ghosal (Apu as a teenager), Santi Gupta (Lahiri’s wife), Ramani Sengupta (Bhabataran), Ranibala (Teli), Sudipta Roy (Nirupama), Ajay Mitra (Anil), Charuprakash Ghosh (Nanda Babu), Subodh Ganguly (Headmaster), Moni Srimani (School Inspector), Hemanta Chatterjee (Professor), Kali Banerjee (Kathak), Lalchand Banerjee (Lahiri), K.S. Pandey (Pandey), Meenaksi Devi (Pandey’s wife), Anil Mukherjee (Abinash), Harendra Kumar Chakravarty (Doctor), Bhagnu Palwan (Palwan). |
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| Awards |
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Golden Lion of St. Mark, Venice Film Festival, 1957 |
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Cinema Nuovo Award, Venice Film Festival, 1957 |
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Critics’ Award, Venice Film Festival, 1957 |
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Best Film and Best Direction, San Francisco Film Festival, 1958 |
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International Critics’ Award, San Francisco Film Festival, 1958 |
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Golden Laurel: Best Foreign Film, USA Film Festival, 1958-59 |
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Selznick Golden Laurel, Berlin Film Festival, 1960 |
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Bodil Award: Best Non-European Film of the Year, Denmark Film Festival, 1967 |
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| Apu's mother pours trickles of the water of the holy Ganga into her husband's gaping mouth before his death |
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| Apu's father,sitting on the ghats (steps) of the Ganga, chants mantras |
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This film dramatizes the death of Apu's father and mother and Apu's own growth into manhood and independence. Set in 1920, the family is living in Benares, where the father reads the scriptures to an audience of widows. They live in a small house in the city. Afflicted with old age and illness, he dies while on the ghats of Benares. Sabajaya is left alone to fend for herself and Apu. She decides to return to live in the country and becomes a cook in a zamindar's house. She wants Apu to become a priest, but he wants to go to school. She makes sacrifices so that he might pursue his studies. Apu, having won a scholarship, departs for Calcutta, leaving her alone. When he returns to the |
| country to see her, he is bored and can't wait to leave again. Sabajaya falls ill and Apu, delayed by his exams, arrives too late. He departs again for Calcutta, sad but free. |
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| Ray's comment on this film: |
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"I was not able to achieve more than 60 percent of what the script demanded... (one of the reasons) being a peculiarly technical one. A camera had just come... and it jammed frequently during the shooting in Benares. It became impossible to do more than one take of a scene... And then we had to rush through the editing stage... because the date of release was getting near. Another problem was that Ravi Shankar should have composed half as much music than he did. There are blank moments as a result. But I find the psychological aspect — the relationship between a growing Apu and his mother — very successful."
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| Apu, an apprentice priest at the village. |
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| Contributed by DKB and AKD |
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