Ritwik Kumar Ghatak was a noted Indian film director, screenwriter, actor and playwright. Along with prominent contemporary Bengali filmmakers like Satyajit Ray, Tapan Sinha and Mrinal Sen, his cinema is primarily remembered for its meticulous depiction of social reality, partition and feminism. He won the National Film Award's Rajat Kamal Award for Best Story in 1974 for his Jukti Takko Aar Gappo and Best Director's Award from Bangladesh Cine Journalist's Association for Titash Ekti Nadir Naam. The Government of India honoured him with the Padma Shri for Arts in 1970.
Meghe Dhaka Tara is a 1960 film written and directed by Ritwik Ghatak, based on a social novel by Shaktipada Rajguru with the same title. It stars Supriya Choudhury, Anil Chatterjee, Gita Dey, Bijon Bhattacharya, Niranjan Roy, and Gyanesh Mukherjee. It was part of a trilogy consisting of Meghe Dhaka Tara (1960), Komal Gandhar (1961), and Subarnarekha (1962), all dealing with the aftermath of the Partition of Bengal during the Partition of India in 1947 and the refugees coping with it.
Madhabi Chakraborty is an Indian actress. She won the National Film Award for Best Actress for her performance in the Bengali film Dibratrir Kabya. She has acted in some of the most critically acclaimed films in Bengali cinema and is considered one of the great actresses of Bengali cinema.
Subodh Ghosh was a noted Indian author of Bengali literature and a journalist with the Kolkata-based daily newspaper Ananda Bazar Patrika. Born at Hazaribagh on 14 September 1909, now in Jharkhand, he studied in St. Columba's College as well as privately with scholar Mahesh Chandra Ghosh. At the beginning of his career, he worked as a bus conductor to support himself while writing on the side. His best known work, Bharat Premkatha, is about the romances of epic Indian characters and has remained very popular in the Bengali literary world. Many of his stories have been adapted for Indian films, most notably Ritwik Ghatak's Ajantrik (1958) and Bimal Roy's Sujata (1959). He won the Filmfare Award for Best Story twice, for Bimal Roy's Sujata (1960) and for Gulzar's Ijaazat in 1989. He was selected for Bharatya Jnanpith Award (1977) But he refused it.
Parallel cinema or New Indian Cinema, is a film movement in Indian cinema that originated in the state of West Bengal in the 1950s as an alternative to the mainstream commercial Indian cinema.
Jukti Takko Aar Gappo is a 1974 Bengali film directed by auteur of Indian cinema Ritwik Ghatak. Jukti Takko Aar Gappo was Ritwik Ghatak's last film. The film was believed to have a cinematography way ahead of its time. The film won National Film Award's Rajat Kamal Award for Best Story in 1974.
Nagarik, also spelled as Nagorik, was the first feature-length film directed by legendary Indian director Ritwik Ghatak. Completed in 1952, it preceded Satyajit Ray's Pather Panchali as perhaps the first example of an art film in Bengali cinema, but is deprived of that honor, since it was released twenty-four years later, after Ghatak's death. On 20 September 1977, it finally premiered at the New Empire theatre in Kolkata, India. Ghatak directed only eight feature films, but is generally regarded as one of the auteurs of Indian cinema and virtually unsurpassed as a creator of powerful imagery and epic style by directors such as Satyajit Ray and of transcendental power and extraordinariness by critics such as Derek Malcolm.
Cinema of West Bengal, also known as Tollywood or Bengali cinema, is an Indian film industry of Bengali-language motion pictures. It is based in the Tollygunge region of Kolkata, West Bengal, India. The origins of the nickname Tollywood, a portmanteau of the words Tollygunge and Hollywood, dates back to 1932. It was a historically important film industry, at one time the centre of Indian film production. The Bengali film industry is known for producing many of Indian cinema's most critically acclaimed global Parallel Cinema and art films, with several of its filmmakers gaining prominence at the Indian National Film Awards as well as international acclaim.
Kaliprasad Banerjee, professionally known as Kali Banerjee was an Indian actor, who worked in the 1950s–1970s in Bengali cinema. He is best known for his work with film directors like Satyajit Ray in Parash Pathar (1958) and Ritwik Ghatak in Nagarik (1952) and Ajantrik (1958).
Komal Gandhar, also known as A Soft Note on a Sharp Scale, is a 1961 Bengali film written and directed by legendary film maker Ritwik Ghatak. The title refers to the Hindustani equivalent of "E-flat". It was part of the trilogy composed of Meghe Dhaka Tara (1960), Komal Gandhar and Subarnarekha (1962), all dealing with the aftermath of the Partition of India in 1947 and the refugees coping with it, though this was the most optimistic film of his oeuvre. The film explores three themes juxtaposed in the narrative: the dilemma of Anusuya, the lead character, the divided leadership of IPTA, and the fallout from the partition of India.
Amar Lenin is a 1970 black and white documentary film directed by film director Ritwik Ghatak made for Government of West Bengal in the centenary year (1970) of the birth of Vladimir Lenin.
Bedeni, also known as Arup Kotha (1951–52), is an unfinished Bengali language film directed by filmmaker Ritwik Ghatak. This was the first movie in which Ritwik worked as a director.
Kato Ajanare (1959) is an unfinished Bengali drama film directed by Ritwik Ghatak. The storyline was based on a Bengali novel written by Mani Shankar Mukherjee with the same title. The film was shot on a 20-day schedule. The shooting was complete, except the court scene. The film was discontinued and abandoned for mainly financial and some other problems.
Meghe Dhaka Tara is a 2013 Indian Bengali film directed by Kamaleswar Mukherjee and made under Shree Venkatesh Films banners. The film is inspired from the life and works of Bengali film director Ritwik Ghatak. The entire film is in black and white except the last scene which has been shot in colour. In this film Saswata Chatterjee plays the character of Nilkantha Bagchi and Ananya Chatterjee plays the role of Durga, Nilkantha's wife. The film was released on 14 June 2013. Besides giving an account of Ghatak's life, the film also depicts the socio-political environment of contemporary West Bengal during the Tebhaga and Naxalite movements.
Kumari Mon (1962) Bengali film directed by Chitrarath. The screenplay of the film was written by Ritwik Ghatak. The film was produced by Film Age and the music director was Jyotirindra Moitra.
Nilkantha Bagchi is an iconic Bengali cinema character that first appeared in 1977 in Ritwik Ghatak's Jukti Takko Aar Gappo. In the 2013 film Meghe Dhaka Tara, the character portrayed by Saswata Chatterjee was named Nilkantha Bagchi. Chatterjee's character was based on the personality of Ritwik Ghatak.
Atithi is a 1965 Bengali drama film based on a short story by Rabindranath Tagore, and directed by Tapan Sinha. It tells a simple story about a teenage boy who prefers the life of a wanderer to the confines of a domestic life. At the 13th National Film Awards, it won the National Award for the Second Best Feature Film. It also won several BFJA Awards. It was India's competitive entry at the Venice International Film Festival in 1966, where it was nominated for the Golden Lion. The film was remade in Hindi as Geet Gaata Chal.
Nabyendu Chatterjee was an Indian Bengali and Hindi film director and producer. A director of twelve feature films and three documentaries, Nabyendu has curved out a sure niche for him in the field of serious and useful cinema of India.
