The Beauty of Bengali Cinema
By Ayesha Ali
Whenever I tell people I’m a languages student, I tell them I study Arabic and Persian. I tell them that I loved studying French and Spanish in school, but my interests always lay elsewhere. I tell them I did Latin and Ancient Greek in my first year out of pure fascination, before realising classics was definitely and ironically not my Roman Empire. I tell them I must've inherited the affinity from my dad, who picked up Russian when he studied in Moscow in his twenties and can still strike up overly long, casual conversation decades later. But what I don’t tell them is that my first language made its own unwelcome home in my mother tongue. That I will always daydream in English and feel estranged from Bengali.
As Sujata Bhatt succinctly articulates in her poem Search for My Tongue: “You ask me what I mean / by saying I have lost my tongue. / I ask you, what would you do / if you had two tongues in your mouth, / and lost the first one, the mother tongue, / and could not really know the other, / the foreign tongue.” It seems a trivial thing to mourn, but the loss is always so palpable that it is impossible to avoid.
I never learned to read the language, and listening to the folk songs my parents enjoy makes it difficult to understand whole sentences instead of specific words and phrases. Even listening to modern music and searching for a translation online, or reading Tagore in English, is jarringly awkward. In my mind, I understood something entirely different that didn't exist through these mediums.
So I turned to film.
The first one I remember watching was an old, black and white film titled Chutir Ghonta, meaning ‘When The Bell Rang,’ directed by Azizur Rahman. It is based on the true story of a twelve year old school boy who was accidentally locked inside a bathroom and starved to death over the Muslim holiday of Eid-al-Adha. It was definitely not the best introduction to Bengali cinema for a child, but so many of the films I knew of were tragic, and I could never understand why.
But what I’ve learned from binge watching films more to my taste is that there’s a quiet, unassuming beauty about them. They don’t raise their voice to capture the viewer’s attention, nor are there any blaring colors or complex action sequences. Instead, they whisper, drawing you into their world with the subtle pull of a tide. There’s a steadfast commitment to the art of storytelling, rich with history, culture, literature and overall artistry. Bengali cinema is essentially a tapestry woven from decades of artistic innovation. It has its roots in the silent film era established by filmmakers like Hiralal Sen, whose entire life’s work was destroyed in a fire in 1917, and Dhirendra Nath Ganguly, who was known for his work in comedy. One of the first comedies is Jamai Babu in 1931, which is the only surviving Bengali silent film, but the transition into producing films with sound nicknamed ‘talkies’ marked the beginning of a golden age.
This period was defined by directors like Satyajit Ray, Ritwik Ghatak, and Mrinal Sen, who introduced a new depth to filmmaking that resonated far beyond the borders of Bengal. It’s impossible to talk about this era without mentioning Pather Panchali, ‘Song of the Little Road,’ the first in Ray’s Apu trilogy and his first major work. The trilogy’s literary origins in Bibhutibhushan Bandopadhyay’s novels form the coming of age narrative that follows the life of the eponymous protagonist and the trials he faces. These range from abject poverty to death, and the trilogy was inspired by French director Jean Renoir and Italian neorealists, a movement which centred narratives around the working-class. And in a turbulent time where the postcolonial world was finally regaining its footing, the collision between East and West simply accelerated. This influence is not surprising, especially because it's reflected back to the viewer today, like in Wes Anderson's film The Darjeeling Limited, which includes some of Ray's original compositions, like ‘Charu's Theme’ from his 1964 film Charulata, ‘The Lonely Wife.’
The film Pather Panchali has a lyrical quality, coming to life through Ray’s sketches and storyboards, accompanied by a soundtrack of ragas on a sitar, a form of classical Indian music. Long, wide-angle shots of trains passing through rural landscapes of wheat fields as Apu and his sister watch it pass reflects the lull of mundane life. Even the constant wall between his parents in every shot represents miscommunication, with the mother constantly worried about her family’s fate and the father naively believing in a better future. While Ray was working on the film, he was also working full time, funding most of the production and working with an inexperienced cast and crew. This did not stop the film from winning a Cannes award and a Diploma of Merit at Edinburgh’s International Film Festival in 1956.
What makes these movies so compelling for me is their uninhibited portrayal of human nature, both the beautiful and the ugly. A stray glance, a hesitant word, the crackle of monsoon rain—every detail is infused with meaning. By the 1980s, commercial films began to take precedence, but the craft of the arthouse tradition remained intact, and their influence seeped into the new films. Filmmakers like Rituparno Ghosh emerged with films like Chokher Bali, ‘Sand in the Eye,’ a film that features major Bollywood star Aishwarya Rai. The film tackles more complicated themes, as Rai plays a recently widowed woman, Binodini, who begins an affair with her close friend Ashalata’s husband. Ghosh crafts intimate portraits of relationships and identity, seamlessly blending tradition with innovation. This is in the stereotypically quiet, unassuming wife and her outspoken and headstrong close friend. Like Pather Panchali, the film is an adaptation of Tagore’s novel of the same name, and the murmured dialogue and psychological realism of socially ostracised young widows reflects this. Rai’s character is an embodiment of intellect and grace, often dressed in simple, earth-toned garb and unadorned with heavy jewellery. Binodini is often seen using binoculars to observe a life she cannot have from a distance, including occasional clandestine looks at Ashalata and her husband, consistently centering the female gaze for a change.
Music is also a significant part of the allure. From the evocative strains of Ravi Shankar’s sitar in Ray’s films, to the heartfelt renderings of Tagore’s Sangeet, music isn’t just background noise—it’s a character in its own right. Even today, films continue to use music to accentuate emotion, whether it’s a haunting score or a rousing folk song. Then there’s the influence of Bengali literature, which has created some of the most memorable cinematic works. Tagore, Bibhutibhushan Bandyopadhyay, and Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay have inspired films that honor their literary origins while adding new layers through the medium of cinema. One example is Ray’s Hirak Rajar Deshe, ‘In the Country of the Diamond King,’ which is an anti-war fantasy film that my dad had seen as a child and showed to me during the summer. As well as expressive acting and subtle social commentary on the vices of greed and control, it features frequent performances of folk songs in an 80s technicolour whimsy. Think Alice in Wonderland, but you can teleport in this one. Even the citizens of the country are brainwashed into reciting and believing rhymes about their societal positions and the king himself, reminiscent of rhythm and poetry.
The stories are personal yet universal, rooted in Bengal and transcending its geography at once. It is the cinema of quiet, where every glance, pause, and silence carries meaning. It doesn’t seek to dazzle; it seeks to connect, inviting us to slow down, reflect, and feel. It doesn’t insist on happy endings or convenient resolutions. Instead, it celebrates the complexity of life—the joy, the sorrow, the journey, and everything in between. And in doing so, it offers something truly rare: a glimpse of ourselves, reflected through the lens of art. It is a gentle reminder of the profound beauty of the everyday.