EntertainmentPosted at: Nov 11 2025 10:18PM


For a long part of my teens Ritwik Ghatak's cinema did not move me: actor Parambrata Chatterjee

Kolkata, Nov 11 (UNI) Actor and filmmaker Parambrata Chatterjee admitted that he did not initially connect with Ritwik Ghatak's films during hie teenage years, though his perception changed as he grew older.
Speaking at a seminar titled 'Centenary Tribute to Ritwik Ghatak & Beyond' at the 31st Kolkata International Film Festival (KIFF), Chatterjee reflected honestly on his evolving relationship with Ghatak's cinema.
"I didn't care a flying hoot about Ghatak's cinema until I was about 15 or 16 years old. Because the time when I was being introduced to Ghatak's cinema, I was about six or seven or eight years old, and I thought that those films were rather jarring, and, you know, because my eyes were just, or my sensibilities were just waking up to the idea of storytelling on screen. And that idea, that mind frame, or mind space was occupied largely by another colossal figure in Bengali/Indian cinema history, and that is Satyajit Ray. So, his films were way more entertaining," he noted.
Chatterjee reflected on what he called a "collective denial" that has gripped post-partition Bengali society. "It just used to strike me quite oddly that the cinema of the '50s and the '60s, till all the way to the end of the '60s, which was right two decades after the largest, the biggest human displacement in the history of the world, probably, at least in the last one century, in modern history, which is the partition of the subcontinent- in those two decades, the cinema that Bengal had produced did not have any sign or any reflection of that incident, of that absolute carnage of an incident, of that political mayhem. The films that were made in the '50s are beautiful films, there's no doubt about it. I still go back and watch the Uttam-Suchitra movies; I love watching them. But it was very odd that the films did not have any reflection of the times or of the recent history that the same race had just undergone, or had just gone through. And it was only with Ghatak's cinema that I, at the age of 15 or 16, realised that, no, there was actually a voice which wanted to address this. And it was not just about the beautiful flower romances and the beautiful music by Hemanta Mukherjee and Shyamal Mitra and some of Salil Chowdhury's songs had some sort of shadow of it, but mostly I'm talking about cinema. And again, I repeat, I mean no disrespect towards the cinema of the '50s and '60s. I love those films, but it just strikes me oddly that I tried to find another voice in terms of the subject matter of the films which were being made, the narratives which were being told, the stories which were being told."
For Chatterjee, watching Komal Gandhar marked the beginning of a deeper journey of self-discovery. "That film told me that not everyone was living in denial." And something that changed in the actor as he belonged to the same lineage that carried the voice.
Another thing the 45-year-old actor shed light upon was how extensively people know about the Punjab partition and how intricately it has been discussed in movies or in books, but something its eastern counterpart lacks.
Touching on identity and belonging, Chatterjee spoke passionately about what being Bengali means to him. "Yes, I am a proud Indian and a global citizen, but before that, I'm a Bengali. And the blood-soaked partition shaped our identity."
Unlike the Hollywood style of heightened drama that focuses on the actor's face, Ghatak took a different route to the same notion by suddenly cutting the scene to a passing train.
Concluding his talk, Chatterjee said softly, "His films jolted me and awakened my conscience."
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