Meghe Dhaka Tara

Plot synopsis:
To Ritwik Ghatak film was not merely a form of entertainment, but a weapon, a medium to portray struggle of common man He was successful neither in his career nor could he become a good family man or husband. Still he was an artist who never compromised for personal gain, fame or profit.
The story of the film starts in 1969 and deals with Ritwik Ghatak's time spent in a mental asylum. It shows Nilkantha being admitted to mental asylum under the supervision of Doctor S. P. Mukherjee. S. P. Mukherjee learns that the Prime Minister of India knows Nilkantha and is fond of his works and may request the hospital authority to take special care of him. In the hospital a police officer sees Nilkantha and tells Doctor Mukherjee that he is a wasted drunkard. Another patient of hospital mocks Nilkantha as a "disgraced intellectual". Even while he was undergoing treatment in the hospitals, he writes a play and stages it with other asylum patients.
The film shows how Durga (Nilkantha's wife) wants to leave him saying "separation is essential". Nilkantha witnessed partition of Bengal and its devastating effect and in his youth became attracted towards communism. Throughout the film Nilkantha's mental agony, struggles, inner contradictions, disappointments as well as financial troubles faced by him are shown. He clearly tells, it is not possible for him to make entertaining or commercial films. During a discussion Nilkantha asks Doctor Mukherjee that should a man perform mujra at a time when the society is burning? He also tells Doctor Mukherjee that he is a "people's artist" and that is his job.
The film also shows the atmosphere of Bengal during Tebhaga and Naxalite movements. A scene has been shown in the film where a book named "How to be a good communist?" is burning. This scene symbolises Ghatak's dissatisfaction with India's communist politics. When Durga tells Nilkantha that they don't have a single rupee to run the family, Nilkantha readily replies, it is not money but it is one's work which will remain forever.

Tags: melodrama

Review:
One charge laid against the revered director Satyajit Ray was that, much like Kurosawa in Japan, his films weren't national or native enough, that they gave a Westerner's view of India, one moulded in Western forms, rather than something 'authentically' Indian.
That said, 'The Cloud-Capped Star' seems to me to be a truer film than 'Pather', not necessarily as a representation of Indian experience, but of human experience, and certainly as a cinema experience, of which it is rare and overwhelming.The irony is that the film is as replete with Western influences as Ray's.
Director Ritwik Ghatak was a left-winger, and his film is a thrilling assault on mind and body, using many of the methods developed by Western leftists.
The film is unashamedly a melodrama - the harrowing tale of a beautiful, clever, promising young woman who is mentally and physically broken by the relentless fending of a family alternately selfish and feckless.
Not only does Ghatak use Sirkian devices - frames within frames, intrusive decor, 'unrealistic' lighting - but he takes the idea of the hysterical body to its limits - just as a character who must repress her emotions betrays them in physical pressures, so the repressions of character and narrative are displaced onto the form of the film, which is full of violent jump cuts, extreme clashes of composition, space and editing,  deliberate dis-integration of musical numbers, a radical use of lighting and sound (including bizarre sci-fi whinings), taken to an extreme unavailable to Sirk in Hollywood, giving the film a formal hysteria that is reminiscent of another Sirk admirer, Godard.
The visionary Bengali filmmaker Ritwik Ghatak peers into the future, and sees nothing but disintegration - succeeding at multiple levels, CLOUD-CAPPED STAR humanizes this bleak vision, by locating the drama in a Bengali family, but everything occurring is something of a howl of outrage at what had become of his divided homeland.The central figure in this sprawling melodrama (with some coincidental resemblances to European new wave and neo-realism) is Nita, the eldest daughter in a once-middle class, intellectual family, driven by partition into refugee status in the slums of Calcutta.
Throughout, Ghatak boils human nature and the survival instinct down to the most ruthless basics: this is a compelling and visionary film, but there is virtually no room for lofty ideals or sentimental altruism in the world created here - mourn what one must, and do what one must do to survive.
Sentiment and ideals are - in this film - luxuries, and from the cruelty of such a truism, Ghatak has created one of cinema's great, vital tragedies.Ghatak claimed few Western cinematic influences - like Jean-Luc Godard in France and Nagisa Oshima in Japan, his primary concerns were historical and political, and also technical - how to alter cinema to express those concerns in accessible language?
For Ghatak the solution was found in using outdoor locations, natural sound, idiosyncratic editing, and a minimum of the flash seen in Bollywood or Hollywood - CLOUD-CAPPED STAR is bleak, absolutely gripping, tragic and infuriating.
This is highly unfortunate - as a film of moral/social outrage, this rivals Bresson; its' overall feel for the everyday reminds one of Italian neo-realism; it's willingness to experiment boldly evokes Godard or Oshima; in it's concerns with the status of women (another of the many themes explored here), it evokes Naruse, Sirk or Mizoguchi.Ghatak's own biography is one of great tragedy; one could possibly read the discretely enraged hopelessness of this film as an extension of his own, and see this as a drive that would have to produce at least one masterpiece (his later SUBARNA-REKHA is also very much worth a look), even as it brought him to a premature end.
Nowhere is this upheaval better portrayed than in the films of Bengali director Ritwik Ghatak.
An active Marxist who began his career in the Communist People's Theater, Ghatak's films never achieved widespread popularity but he is now considered to be one of the top Indian directors of the last half of the 20th century.
His best known film, The Cloud-Capped Star, the first in a trilogy examining the economic effects of partition, is a powerful story about a young Indian women who sacrifices her education and marriage in order to hold her family together.
Ghatak's inspiration for the character was a woman he saw at a bus stop whose beaten down appearance struck him as being typical of Bengali refugees.
Neeta (Supriya Choudhury) is the youngest daughter of a refugee family from East Pakistan who lives in a middle class home near Calcutta.
Neeta is a college student whose brother Shankar (Anil Chaterjee) is a layabout, an aspiring singer who lives off the family while practicing his art and dreaming of a career on the concert stage.
Neeta also has an attractive sister Gita (Gita Ghatak) and a brother Mantu (Dwiju Bhawal) who is also a promising student.
Neeta is a good-hearted young woman, but one who fails to consider her own needs and puts off plans for marriage with Sanat (Niranjan Ray), an intellectual studying for a Phd. Sanat, unwilling to wait for her, becomes infatuated with Neeta's sister Gita and they marry to Neeta's dismay.
The Cloud-Capped Star is an angry film and often bleak, but sudden bursts of sitar music and joyous singing by Shankar lighten the tone.
Ghatak's raw passion and compelling characters make it easy to overlook its flaws and the result is a tribute to the human spirit and a deeper understanding of the tragedy that partition brought to India..
This movie by Ritwik Ghatak is on the list of most of the Indian big times directors as one of the best movies of Indian cinema.
The name of the movie means Cloud Capped Star  what a lovely name.The story is about a girl Nita (Supriya Choudhury) in a family who have migrated to India from Bangladesh, after the partition and staying in a small West Bengal town in poverty.
Nita's boy friend Sanat (Niranjan Roy) gets attracted to her sister Gita (Gita Ghatak) and marries her.
Nita carrier the burden of all these silently, but it takes toll on her health and mind  who is finally sent to treatment in a remote hospital where Shankar goes to meet her in the end of the movie.The movie though latent in high emotions is a superb story unfolding, with so much humanness that it touches your heart even today  through it (sometimes) melodramatic 1960 style.This was the first movie of Ritwik Ghatak that I have seen till date, and I consider myself fortunate, because Ritwik was called by the Life Time Oscar winner Satyajit Ray as his inspiration and Satyajit Ray always considered Ritwik the best in India.Ritwik presents the drama with such finness of light and darkness, using great visuals, sound and symbols to present a tender emotion.
The foliage, the train, the mountains, the soul rendering vocals remain with you for long after the movie.A must see for all the students of good cinema.
Nature plays an intricate role in many of his cinemas like Ajantrik and it often highlights the character and gives it also a context, done in the most effective and subtle way.The second quality of this movie is the usage of classical music so deliberately for mood change.
The effect of partition on the Bengali people have never been captured so authentically as been done here, the characters so identifiable, the story so representative and the settings so familiar.The fourth and true to the identity of the genre it belongs to, this movie is a cinematographic excellence.
Also there are other aspects of it like there are meaning to be understood by relating the context and what been showed, something Satyajit is very good at, Ritwik great at and been taken to extreme by Mrinal Sen.The fifth and most touching part of it is the storyline.
If Satyajit Ray is the virtuoso of Indian cinema, Ghatak is the maverick.
it's just that he made films for the love of it and never for anyone else that this somewhat forgotten legend later realised to be great made such a deep film.This film is not about cinematography unlike ray's but this is about the script.The scene where the father say's "you bore the burden and now you are the burden,you shall go' is a landmark in itself.Especially the believe in her somewhat useless brother who becomes a gr8singer in bollywood .This film has to be seen without any distractions.i give film -10 ,script -11, and cinematography -9 all out of 10.The background music is amazing ,it;s tearful.After ,watching i am almost compelled to take up a camera and shoot a film for myself.I don't care about this plastic world anymore..
'Meghe dhaka tara' or the 'Cloud-clapped Star' is definitely one of the best films ever directed in Bengali,and it vividly portrays the directing skills of Ritwik Ghatak.
The story revolves around a lower-middle class Bengali family, who lived in the refugee colonies situated in the outskirts of Kolkata.
The father of the family was a English teacher and his eldest son 'Shankar'(Anil Chatterjee) was a promising young classical singer while the youngest son 'Montu' played football.
Nita and Gita were two sisters, the former being somewhat responsible, caring, loving while the latter was simply a beauty conscious,lazy, insincere flirt.
Another important character of the movie was Sanat, a talented Physics research fellow whom Nita sponsored for she had affections on him.
According to the story Nita a working woman, couldn't spare time on him and Gita, her sister began having relations with him and eventually they married.
One the last scenes perhaps the best of the film wonderfully shows Nita's love for life, her urge for struggle and her positive thinking.
The film over all portrays the life-struggle of a promising family with contemporary middle class livelihood.
Actings of Anil Chatterjee and Supriya Devi is of high quality and the over all direction, screen-play, music equally good.
Things have changed, though, and it is nice to have such a compelling piece of art to retain those memories.But of course Ghatak is working on two planes in this movie.
I was quite late into watching Ritwik Ghatak and when I saw Saswata's Meghe Dhaka Tara on the life of this master film-maker himself, I chose to see his original creation by the name.
One of the great films of Indian Cinema.
The great Ritwik Ghatak's iconic film "Meghe Dhaka Tara" (translated as the Cloud-Capped Star), is perhaps his most popular and famous film.
The overwhelming tragic nature of the film is what makes it so memorable in the minds of cinema-goers the world over, who are bound to if not identify, they will most certainly feel for the characters of this very human, and very touching story.
The character of Nita (played brilliantly by Supriya Choudhury) is a girl from a middle class Bengali family living near Calcutta (now re-named as Kolkata).
She is the protective sister to her brother Shankar (played by Anil Chatterjee) who is portrayed as a lazy sort of chap who aspires to be a singer and like most aspiring artists, lives off his family looking to them for financial support.
So quite obviously, like in most families, the parents have issues with their son, but Nita defends him from her parents as her love for her brother goes very deep.
Apart from Nita and Shankar, there are two other siblings in the family, a brother Mantu, a good student (played by Dwiju Bhawal) and Gita (played by her namesake Gita Ghatak).
Nita's father (played by Bijon Bhattacharya) is unwell and is unable to take on the responsibility of his family as would be his traditional role as the patriarch.
So non-traditionally so, Nita being the daughter, takes on the responsibility which would traditionally be that of the son of the family, of being the sort of head of the household, due to her education.
So in a way this is one of Indian cinema's strongest feminist movies showing a woman sacrificing her marriage and education for the greater good and well being of her family and loved ones.
But whoever the real life inspiration may be, one thing is for sure, is that this female leading character is etched in the minds and memories of cine-goers across the world.Perhaps modern and "refined" audiences today might find the sentiment of the film "melodramatic", but if you ask me, such things are subjective, and with such fine craftsmanship as Ghatak's with the characters developing so subtly and naturally, one can't help but be swept away by the heightened emotion of the film.
The cinematography and lighting are so artistic that it is not surprising that this film is not just watched by film lovers but also studied widely by film students, making "Meghe Dhaka Tara" still one of the most celebrated and talked about films in the history of Indian cinema.
The exaggerated expressions carried on for a long time in the film and in a way made the viewer disbelieve the character the actors were trying to play.
The father who plays an open minded man with his love for literature; Shankar, an aspiring musician who is scorned upon by many for his idleness and Sanat, who promises to marry Nita but ends up marrying her sister.
Although the film contained some beautiful scores, the actor (Shankar) lost the dub and hence the high-pitched songs lost their effect, as he couldn't fortify the passion and rhythm the songs contained.
One song that I honestly appreciated was the baul track in the middle of the film, which was sung by an actor playing a baul and was beautifully composed and shot.Although a great story of Nita told by the end of the film, I wish they had avoided these little technical glitches in order for this film to showcase some great cinema and talent.
Ghatak although directed this film rather well lost out in a few sequences and scenes but still had the emotions of the story felt by the viewer's.
Being an ardent Satyajit Ray fan, any Indian film that I saw after his, never quite had the same impact on me.
Needless to say when I began watching 'Meghe Dhaka Tara' (The Cloud Capped Star) I was not expecting much.
The rhythm of the film, in the beginning (ironically like Ray's) is quite slow, then it increases in tempo, slowly captivating and engaging the viewer by its beautiful emotional appeal.
It narrates the story of a beautiful, qualified and selfless young woman, Nita, as she attempts to hold together a family that is already 'broken'.
It is not that they don't love her (notice the mother's apologetic plea to her daughter in one scene and her father's continuous acknowledgment of her suffering), they know their situation can't be helped.
In that sense she is more akin to Ernest Hemmingway's Santiago from 'The Old Man and the Sea', displaying a tremendous 'grace under pressure'.Unlike his contemporary Satyajit Ray, Ghatak remained largely unknown to international audiences.Battered by mental and emotional pain, he himself seems to embody the image of 'the cloud capped star'forever unknown (or at least shrouded) to the film world and future generations of viewers as the 2013 biographical film of the same name portrays.
Meghe Dhaka Tara (The Cloud-Capped Star) by the respected Indian director Ritwik Ghatak is an intense human drama starring renowned Bengali actors Anil Chatterjee and Supriya Choudhury in the lead roles.Meghe Dhaka Tara is an experience too enormous and deep to be described in words.
The film portrays their struggles and their fight for life in conditions that apparently do not tire of hurling new challenges, difficulties and tragedies at them.Ritwik Ghatak's masterly portrayal of all the characters, their interactions and how they influence each others' fortunes make this film a timeless classic.
Anil Chatterjee and Supriya Choudhury deliver stunning performances and are ably supported by the rest of the cast.To conclude, Meghe Dhaka Tara is a film that draws upon the full strength of the medium of cinema to tell its story, and the resulting force is so strong that it leaves one reeling at the end.
The book of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die is where I found this Indian film, it sounded like an odd title, so obviously I didn't know what to expect, and I didn't really read what the plot would involve, so I watched hoping for the best.
Basically, set in the 1950s, in the suburbs of Bengali, beautiful young girl Nita (Supriya Choudhury) who lives with her refugee family from East Pakistan, she has sacrificed a lot for the family to get by.
Her family included, she is exploited by everyone around her, they all take her good nature, while her older brother Shankar (Anil Chatterjee) wants to become a singer, and does not care for her family or their wishes for him.
Also starring Bijon Bhattacharya as Father, Gita Dey as Mother, Dwiju Bhawal as Mantu and Niranjan Ray as Sanat.
The later stages of 'Meghe Dhaka Tara' opt increasingly towards the latter with a fanciful combination of expressionistic visuals and weird sound effects.The passage of time is inclined to render vintage films depicting poverty picturesque to later audiences, and the sympathetic characters, superb photography by Dinen Gupta and the beauty of the two sisters and of the rural setting further conspire to make 'Meghe Dhaka Tara' as engrossing a cinematic experience as the reality of the genteel poverty experienced by Neeta's family would have been soul-destroying to experience on a day-to-day basis.SPOILER COMING: That Neeta's brother Shankar actually achieves his dream of success would seem a concession to the need to provide a happy ending; except that the family's salvation has been achieved only at the cost of sacrificing Neeta, having wrecked first her hopes and then her health.