Directed by Satyajit Ray • 1965 • India
Starring Soumitra Chatterjee, Madhabi Mukherjee
Satyajit Ray explores the ache of desire in this exquisitely brief, emotionally layered chamber piece, in which Amitabha (Soumitra Chatterjee), a screenwriter from Kolkata, finds himself unexpectedly reunited with his now-married former lover Karuna (Madhabi Mukherjee) when his car breaks down near her home in the countryside. As memories and feelings from the past resurface, Amitabha must confront one of his life’s greatest regrets.
The following interview with actor Madhabi Mukherjee, who plays Arati in THE BIG CITY, was conducted in Calcutta in 2013.
In the following interview, conducted in 2013, Satyajit Ray scholar and author Suranjan Ganguly discusses how Ray presents women faced with the challenges of modernity in THE BIG CITY, CHARULATA, and THE COWARD.