Satyajit Ray's movie prints restored, to be showcased to audiences soon

Renowned film director Satyajit Ray's early black and white movies have all been restored and will be showcased before global audiences soon, said the movie maestro's son Sandip Ray on Tuesday.

He said that his father's work remained popular because of an element of "timelessness" in the films he made starting with Pather Panchali' (song of the road) which was released in 1955, winning laurels at the Cannes festival.

"We could not do much to celebrate Satyajit Ray's 100th birth anniversary (in 2021) because of the pandemic. We will chalk out a program to celebrate it on a grander scale including having a retrospective of his cinema.

"Most of his movies all the black and white films included have been restored. We are now working on restoring 'Kanchenjunga' (a family drama based on an original Ray screenplay)," said Sandip Ray, a well-known film director in his own right, in an interview to PTI Video.

The younger Ray who has made a series of detective movies based on stories written by his father, a versatile writer, artist and graphic designer besides being a director, was holding a small celebration of his father's 102nd birth anniversary at his Bishop Lefroy Road flat in Kolkata.

Talking about the state of his father's movie prints, scripts and other documents, Sandip Ray said, "We are alert and will see to it that his films do not suffer any more damage."

Many of Ray's early work had suffered damage due to time and exposure to the elements but painstaking work by a foundation has seen the prints restored and digitsed.

The younger Ray said that he did not wish to take up the projects his father had wanted to make movies on but could not such as on the Mahabharata character Karna'.

We do not wish to work on them (the shelved project) as only Satyajit Ray could have done justice to them, he said.

Speaking about his own plans, he said another 'Feluda' (a detective character created by his father) novel will be taken up for adaptation soon, casting actor Indraneil Sengupta who had delivered a credible performance in the last Feluda film on big screen, 'Hatyapuri' (Murder in Puri), in the key role of the fictional super-sleuth.

Asserting more films for big screen on Feluda's exploits will be made by him in future, Sandip Ray clarified to a question, "we have no issue if Feluda stories are adapted for net-based platform. There can be creative liberty. But we hope the spirit of the main story is retained in the adaptations."

Sandip said directors like Srijit Mukherjee and now Arindam Sil, who are adapting Feluda in OTT, are both talented film makers and he has full faith in them.

The younger Ray also indicated that he would be making a second movie based on another of his father's fictional characters Prof Shonku a brilliant if slightly eccentric scientist and inventor who lives with his cat named after Sir Issac Newton.