The Big City (Criterion Collection) [Blu-ray] Review
Sinopsis
THE BIG CITY (Mahanagar), set in mid-1950s Calcutta and directed by the great Satyajit Ray (The Music Room), follows the personal triumphs and frustrations of Arati (Madhabi Mukherjee), who decides, despite the initial protests of her bank-clerk husband, to take a job to help support their family. With remarkable sensitivity and attention to the details of everyday working-class life, Ray gradually builds a powerful human drama that is at once a hopeful morality tale and a commentary on the identity of the contemporary Indian woman.Subrata Mazumdar (Anil Chatterjee) is struggling to support his extended family in the big city of Calcutta. He has a job as an accountant at a new bank, but he doesn't make enough to make ends meet. Going against the norm, his wife, Arati (Madhabi Mukherjee), decides that she must find a job. Condemned by her conservative father-in-law, she begins working as a door-to-door salesgirl, representing a line of knitting machines.
The better she does at her job, the happier and more confident she becomes. But this change makes her husband extremely unhappy. He finally insists that she resign her position. He'll find a part-time job instead. But just before she can do this, there is a run on Subrata's bank and it must close. Jobless, he has to live with the shame of having his wife support him. Like Charulata, this film eventually resolves itself on a more hopeful note than much of director Satyajit Ray's work.
Although made in 1963, this film has a surprisingly modern feel to it. The problems faced by the Mazumdar family in Calcutta do not seem too different from those faced by families in Cincinnati or Cairo today. Ray does a masterful job of visual storytelling, and the performances of the entire cast are both evocative and moving. Ray favorite Madhabi Mukherjee, who also appeared in Charauta, is simply amazing as she transforms herself from an obedient, spoiled wife to a confident, hardworking career woman. --Luanne Brown
