Days and Nights in the Forest
Desiring a reprieve from the hectic bustle of Calcutta, four friends - group leader and driver Ashim (Soumitra Chattopadhyay, "The World of Apu"), bookish Sanjoy (Subhendu Chattopadhyay, "The Zoo"), ladies man cricketeer Hari (Shamit Bhanja) and the group's unemployed mascot Shekhar (Robi Ghosh) - use late nineteenth century forester Sanjib Chattopadhyay's study of Palamu and its Santal people as a travel guide, but the highly educated city boys will learn several lessons spending "Days and Nights in the Forest."
Laura's Review: A
Janus Films is rereleasing a 4K restoration of one of "Apu trilogy" writer/director Satyajit Ray's lesser seen works and it is a most welcome rediscovery, his 1970 adaptation of Sunil Gangopadhyay's novel exposing the cultural and class divisions between India's Westernized city dwellers and its rural citizens over the course of a long weekend. The film is often funny, featuring romantic entanglements which also highlight the emotional maturity of the city women the four men come across, but also veers into tragedy with the lives of two Santal women who come into their orbit.
The film begins as a boisterous road trip, Ashim driving with Shekhar up front while Hani sleeps in the back as Sanjoy reads Chattopadhyay, telling the others than women in Palamu drink alcohol, but are rarely seen drunk, a tidbit that intrigues them. They tease Hani about being lovesick over his recent breakup which he claims to have initiated but which a flashback reveals as a lie. Shooting in black and white, Ray's cinematographer Soumendu Roy finds unusual angles for visual interest inside and outside the car, at one point framing Shekhar behind a gas nozzle projecting from the car's tank like Dustin Hoffman behind Anne Bancroft's leg in "The Graduate." They pick up Lakha, a local, as a guide. When they arrive at their destination, a rural 'forest house,' a sign at the gate says not to enter without a reservation, which they ignore. The house's watchman (Nilotpal Dey) tries to get them to leave, saying the rule is strict and that he will lose his job, but they wear him down with their arrogance and a wad of bills, something we will learn the honest man accepted for a reason. 'Thank God for corruption,' says one and when they learn there is little food available, the watchman telling them his wife, who usually cooks, is very ill, Lakha eagerly volunteers to get groceries and the watchman reluctantly agrees to cook them.
The four friends will have encounters with Palamu's strong drink, eyeing the local women who sit in a circle, one, whom Shekhar dubs 'Miss India' but whose name is Duli (Simi), catching Hari's eye and asking for more booze. Shekhar will also spot two more upper class women walking along the road and when the group spies Aparna (Sharmila Tagore, ("The World of Apu") and Jaya (Kaberi Basu) playing badminton from the road, Aparna's father,
Sadashiv Tripathi (Pahadi Sanyal) will come out to investigate and then invite them in. After Ashim notes a cabin on the premises, Aparna invites him to view her 'meditation shack,' where he will grab an opportunity to play Romeo on its balcony, but just as the party's getting started, the watchman appears on the road yelling that the Ranger wishes to see them. That Ranger warns them that what they've done is against the rules and that the Constable is set to appear the next day and very well may demand their departure as well as sacking the watchman. But Shekhar forges ahead, taking money from the common fund to give to Duli and two others to wait on them hand and foot, at least until the watchman shoos them off, calling them 'bad women.'
As it turns out Aparna will arrive just in time to smooth things over, the family well known to the Constable, preceding a game of Memory which she is clearly set to win but cedes to Ashim. The men will continually embarrass themselves, caught bathing at the well as Mr. Tripathi's family drives by, then boisterously drunk at night in the road, unaware that the car they are blocking is being driven by Jaya, Aparna laughing at their foolishness. A trip to a local carnival is beautifully captured by Roy, who delights in POVs from its ferris wheel, yet finds a calm horizon for Arpana to reveal the roots of her restraint to Ashim. Ray closes his compact but sprawling adventure with moments low and high. Lakha, who is always asked for change when returning from an errand as if he can't be trusted, exacts revenge against Hari for his crime against his people while Arpana exposes all of their indifference to the suffering right under their noses. Jaya, who Sanjoy was happy to learn is widowed, is demoralized by his inability to act on his obvious attraction, but has had the courtesy to both excuse them for missing a breakfast engagement and who sends them on their way with a tiffin full of eggs. And as they all set to leave, two deer grace them with their presence, leaping into the forest.
"Days and Nights in the Forest" shows us a playful Satyajit Ray working on a global stage while still exposing the class injustices of his home country. Janus's 4K restoration release of this 1970 film deserves celebration.
Robin's Review: B+
Four friends from Calcutta, and different walks of life, are on a much-needed vacation to remote Palamu, where life is easy and women plentiful. But, each will be changed by their "Days and Nights in the Forest."
Iconic director Satyajit Ray made this 1970 treatise on spoiled entitled men – yes, even in India – on a getaway from the cloying "civilization" of the big city. They come upon a forest sanctuary that requires a reservation to use the bungalow. The leader of the four, businessman Ashim (Soumitra Chatterjee), browbeats and bribes the chowkidar caretaker into letting them stay, and risk losing his precious job.
Symbolically, they burn a Calcutta newspaper to represent their temporary break with civilization. They then see two young women, visitors also, who live nearby, but they, at first, ignore the boys. The four then retire to a local bar in the village where they drink the local firewater and are intrigued by a drunken local beauty, Duli (Simi Garewal). Hari (Sumit Bhanja), recently dumped by his girlfriend in Calcutta, becomes smitten with the drunken woman, which leads to trouble.
Eventually, they get to meet the visiting ladies, Aparna (Sharmila Tagore) and her widow sister-in-law Jaya (Kaberi Bose), with varying degrees of success. The guys are not the suave men of the world they think they are but, despite their bruised egos, they persist.
Satyajit Ray, is best known for his works from the 1950s, particularly the "Apu" trilogy. Here, he deals with the privileged males of big city India and their "strangers in a strange land" journey that will take some of the wind out of their fragile sails. All of the characters are three dimensional with the guys showing their individual foibles and the women showing they are the superior players in the story.
We get a specific look into a subset of Indian society, mainly the spoiled and sensitive egos of the men. The four represent different aspects of Indian maleness from confident Ashim, to the confused and easily smitten Hari, introspective Sanjoy (Subhendu Chatterje) and comic-relief Shekhar (Rabi Ghosh).
It is fun to see the transformation of the four friends as they lose their citified self-confidence and, actually, grow up a bit.
Janus films released the 4K restoration of "Days and Nights in the Forest" in NY on 2/27/26 expanding in subsequent weeks.
