User reviews

Although Satajit Ray was to old, sick and spent to fully appreciate his special Oscar, it was to the Academy's credit that it finally did recognize this supreme artist.

It's often been said that "Aparajito" is the lesser of the three film that comprise "The Apu Trilogy." I personally don't buy that. Here is a finely etched portrait of a young man as he leaves his primitive Indian village and widowed mother to better himself through education at a Calcutta University.

The relationship between mother and son are beautifully presented, with their differing values representative of passing generations. The circumstances may be specific, while the story is universal.

It is about the age-old tension between human choices and challenging environments, about the balancing of values in achieving one's heart's desires.

The emotional fluctuations felt by both mother and son are sharply depicted, including the loss of one's parents as a unique, one-time experience. One must pick up the pieces and move on, as Apu does.

Viewing "Pather Panchali," "Aparajito" and "The World of Apu" in one continuous sequence is the proper way to get the full impact of this incredible piece of work.

This is so much heart touching movie with extra ordinary acting. The acting of the mother of apurba by Karuna Bannerjee is marvelous. The relationship between mother and son, showing in the film is so much heart touching. I watched with my friend at 7 pm and before complete the movie i called the mom and again after completing i calling her twice. She wondered what happened to me ! Not only me, my friend also call his home now regularly. That's the effect of the Aparajito. Satyajit Ray is the greatest director of India. There have no mistake in this classic play. Apu, his father, the principal, everyone is perfect. If you still not watching this movie, you missing something in your life. Enjoy and feel it, still hurting me.

I am always a bit dismayed by the attention that Pather Panchali and Charulata command in discussions on Ray because while they are fine films, they do not account for Ray's cinema as a whole. In fact, I would resist from picking one or even three films that 'speak for Ray'- but I would be lying if I said I didn't have a favourite. Aparajito is a wonderful work of art, an extremely moving melodrama and a remarkably accurate portrayal of adolescence. Of course, it would be shameful to give all the credit to Ray. Bibhuti Bhusan Bandhyopadhaya's novels (Aparajito is adapted from the last part of Pather Panchali and the first half of Aparajito) are meticulously descriptive and Ray's success with the film owes much to the simplicity and honesty of his source. But there is something in Aparajito that belongs exclusively to the cinema - something that has to do with the the mixture of distance and intimacy in the movies, of identification and unfamiliarity. You want to feel like Aparajito is a film about you, but you secretly admit that it isn't, it cannot be - because you experience it outside yourself, in Ravi Shankar's beautiful music, in the photography that oscillates between banality and the deeply metaphoric, in the wonderful performances (especially by Karuna Bannerjee), and finally in Ray's masterful vision in putting it all together. I couldn't say much else - you must experience it for yourself!

Each of the three films of the Apu Trilogy exhibit the extraordinary quality of a documentary film on the conditions of life in India at the time they are set. I think this is what I like best in them through numerous viewings. The films are shot in locations that appear untouched by any art department - remote countryside in Bengal, the great cities - Benares and Calcutta. The characters eke out an adequate life in their sufficient poverty - a life sustained by their faith and simple devotion to one another. At the same time there are moments that are pure cinema. There is an exquisite swish pan cut from Kurana (the mother) leaning against a tree, full of emptiness as Apu has just left for Calcutta, to the swift dynamo of the train crossing a bridge with the trestles a blur. At the moment Kanu (the father) gives up his soul a flock of birds alights over the Ganges. Later as Kurana is gradually sinking into the depths of loneliness - a sickness unto death - she has a vision of fireflies swirling around in the falling darkness.

These films traverse the drama of life and death touching gently on all of the salient points along the path. They put us face to face with the challenge of living in a world, which constantly gives us disappointment. At the same time there is a celebration of that ineffable quality which gives life meaning.

Ray's 'Aparajito' continues with its second installment as we see the beautiful but harsh world through the eyes of 'Apu'. Ray's portrayal of Apu's innocence and curiosity during his maturation into adolescence was spectacular. However, the pinnacle of the film is heart wretching performance of Apu's Mother, whose portrayal of fretfulness, nurturing, and loneliness pulled at this reviewer's heart strings. Although this film is filled with moments of sadness and despair, this film is about Apu weathering the seemingly endless storm of personal tragedy and eventually reaching maturation.

'Aparajito', the second film of Satyajit Ray's brilliant 'Apu Trilogy', is one of the great masterpieces of film. The gritty realism melds expertly with the beautiful shot selection and cinematography. In fact, I would say Ray's India is presented at least as well as John Ford's American West. What is essentially a simple tale of one particular family turns into an epic of emotion and the difficulties of growing up. Truly amazing.

We saw the movie in a theatre in Houston. It was a sizeable crowd. And when the movie ended, there was a long silence as folks gathered themselves from an emotional experience they probably had never experienced. As we slowly walked out and went to the underground parking garage, we noticed several couples were still contemplating the movie as they sat silently in their cars.

Aparajito or the Unvanquished, promotes the human spirit. We will all pass away, but it is how we live and struggle is what counts. As the recent Storms in our part of the world had shown great losses to the lives of many, yet we must continue with our struggle on a path of goodness and decency against insurmountable odds at times.

Aparajito will forever engrave in your hearts the choices we face in our lives and what is important and what is fluff? See the movie and let us hear from you.

Again it is movie making at its peak.

All the comments I entered for PP and then some. The best thing about this movie is a treat to us, the audience. We get two different versions of Apu here. Both rocked AF. Even the sadness will reach to its peak here. I think the best photography in the series we get here. There are internet rumours about the invention of bounce light, but I do not how much it is true. This is even the hardcore fans' favourite, but that might be general conclusion of this movie's very few telecasts in DD Bangla. Again I want to mentioned again about its awesome photography, because Ray loved shooting in Benares and all the outdoor shots in this film can be celebrated separately. This teen drama, or as they say coming of age film, succeeds to give the transition between the other two and stands strong as a standalone film as well.

In 1920, in Benares, the ten-year old boy Apu lives happily with his mother and his father. When his father dies, Apu and his mother move to a village with her uncle. Soon Apu asks his mother to study in the local school where he becomes a distinguished student. When Apu is a teenager, the headmaster offers a scholarship to him to study in Calcutta and her mother gives her savings to him to support his new life. Apu works at a printing press at night to support himself in Calcutta while his mother misses him. But soon he neglects his mother and the college. When he learns that his mother is sick, he returns to the village where she is to visit her, but it may be too late.

"Aparajito" is a realistic drama with the coming of age of Apu in a big city and the loneliness of his mother in a village in the poor Bengal countryside. The story is very simple but with great performances that give the sensation of a documentary. Apu's new life makes him forget his beloved mother and in the end he learns that parents do not live forever and he should have given more attention to her before it is too late. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "O Invencível" ("The Invincible")

The sun wakes up in the land of Benaras. An aged temple priest scatters seeds for the pigeons. Men take their morning dip in the holy river bordering a ghat (series of steps). Women wash their clothes in the same waters. A couple of pehelwans (wrestlers) exercise with gadas (heavy Indian club) close to the river banks. Priests sit close by sermonizing to their loyal devotees. Ships can be heard at a distance. It is morning.

Have we never seen a morning like this? We probably have, at least most who live or have lived in India. Yet why do we watch this morning with a quaint fascination? This is because Satyajit Ray doesn't regard his morning sequence as an establishment shot as most directors would – his camera gazes with wonderment at how life begins in the land of Benaras, and that gives his morning a wholly distinctive identity.

We find young Apu walking beside the ghat one morning, passing by the chanting priests and their devotees and stopping where a pehelwan is exercising. He fixedly gazes at the gada which the hefty pehelwan is swinging around his body, and then leaves. After his father's untimely demise, he reluctantly becomes a priest at the insistence of a male relative.

But he seems to have little interest in this, as evident in a scene where he watches, in his priest's attire, a couple of young boys his age tumbling and gamboling happily at a distance and then follows them after ditching his dhoti. He watches as they enter a school and then at night asks his mother whether he can join the same school. Once he gets admission, he's found to be a bright student who can recite lok-geet (folk music) fluently, and we realize maybe his short stint as a priest did pay off well.

Apu's world is simple, yet his life is profound. There isn't explicit symbolism anywhere yet but we know how symbolic each event in his journey is, as evident from the paragraph above. Moving to a big city like Benares from a tiny village like Nischindipur, living the city life shortly till the death of his father, moving to another village called Dewanpur, attending a school nearby and earning a scholarship, moving to Calcutta for further studies with little enthusiasm to return to the dismal village life are covered in Aparajito.

Apu's thinking, values and priorities blossom as his life passes these phases; take a scene in the film where Apu, in his teens, watches a couple of street children performing but finds their act uninteresting and leaves. Had this been young Apu, he'd be very enthused by their performance and watched it till the end. Aparajito is Apu All Grown Up.

His self-sacrificing mother Sarbajaya gives him all her hard-earned money so he can move to Calcutta, and she surrenders herself to a life of loneliness. Apu's priorities shift towards college studies and printing press work, and he only visits her once in every few months. Satyajit Ray uses still shots to capture her emotions and actress Karuna Banerjee's eyes speak volumes; her memorable 'Opu!' for calling Apu (Bengalis usually pronounce many of their words with an 'O' intonation) stayed with me long after the film ended.

Apu's college life was probably the only sequence that impressed me less, only because I've already seen similar scenes in many other recent movies. But what matters at last is our strong attachment to Apu's world; we laugh with, weep for and find joy in watching his world. Part of the credit has to go to Ravi Shankar's enchanting score, dominated by sitar, flute and dholak, for creating the right mood for each scene.

Satyajit Ray's Pather Panchali and Aparajito give the pleasure of experiencing the same world through his eyes. And we are swept over completely.

Each of the three films of the Apu Trilogy exhibit the extraordinary quality of a documentary film on the conditions of life in India at the time they are set. I think this is what I like best in them through numerous viewings. The films are shot in locations that appear untouched by any art department - remote countryside in Bengal, the great cities - Benares and Calcutta. The characters eke out an adequate life in their sufficient poverty - a life sustained by their faith and simple devotion to one another. At the same time there are moments that are pure cinema. There is an exquisite swish pan cut from Kurana (the mother) leaning against a tree, full of emptiness as Apu has just left for Calcutta, to the swift dynamo of the train crossing a bridge with the trestles a blur. At the moment Kanu (the father) gives up his soul a flock of birds alights over the Ganges. Later as Kurana is gradually sinking into the depths of loneliness - a sickness unto death - she has a vision of fireflies swirling around in the falling darkness.

These films traverse the drama of life and death touching gently on all of the salient points along the path. They put us face to face with the challenge of living in a world, which constantly give us disappointment. At the same time there is a celebration of that ineffable quality which gives life meaning.

The sequel to Pather Panchali.. there are some films that give life lessons that may leave a mark on anybody who watches it. And even though it was made in the 1950s in a rural context, I believe the theme of the movie is very much relatable to the present young generation coming from middle and higher class families as well..!! Sometimes we need to make choices that does not amount to success.. sometimes we need to make choices that we will less regret.

The description of this movie seemed so bleak that I had a difficult time before finally deciding to watch it. I have been watching a lot of Satyajit Ray films lately, and wondering at how he managed to create such different atmospheres in each of them, and leaving a touch of his own self in each. The story is a fairly depressing one, and yet there are moments of delightful optimism within the lead characters. The two boys playing Apu at different ages are both very convincing in their roles, but Karuna Banerjee's performance seals the deal for me. The way she has used her dialogues and her silence to bring out the emotions felt by her character and the interactions she has with her on-screen son, have been truly remarkable. The run-time is about an hour and 45 minutes but this movie will stay with you.

There have been many poignant moments in this movie, but one which is most hard-hitting is where a critical point in the film is signified with a shot of a flock of pigeons flying away against the beautiful backdrop of the river Ganges - powerful! The story by Bibhutibhushan Bandopadhyay is so entrenched in intense emotions but this movie does full justice to the material.

The title is wholly significant and portrayed wonderfully in the movie conclusion. Aparajito - a beautiful concoction of pain, struggle, and incredible determination.

While this film is generally thought to be the weakest link in the Apu chain, and I generally agree, it's a bit like saying that Ava Gardner's legs are her third best feature. I mean, they're still pretty spectacular, right? So what you have here is a timeless story of a youth emerging into manhood and, in the process, freeing himself, quite literally, from the thrall of his parents, especially that of his loving, too controlling mother. And while the story is well told, with magnificent set pieces, such as the life of the city of Benares which centers on the spirituality industry of the Ganges complete with competing holy men and constant immersions, and the sadness in the eyes and body language of Apu's mother once she realizes that she has lost him to the wider world being the two most indelible for me, there are undeniable lapses in writer director Satyajit Ray's story choices. The father's death, in my opinion, occurs too soon so that it lacks the dramatic impact it should have had and certain characters, like the lecherous neighbor in Benares and the kindly great uncle who rescues Apu and his mother after the dad dies, are woefully under explored, while too much time is given to Apu's college life in Kolkata and his friendship with a male student (another character not gone into with sufficient depth). And while these story lapses are not fatal or even harmful, when you compare them to the seamless flow of Ray's preceding film, "Panther Panchali", where there is not a single scene or character wasted, you can see why film critics at the time were not as impressed with this second installment in the triptych. For me, however, the biggest disappointment has nothing to do with the foregoing story problems but is centered around the fact that I will no longer get to see the magnificent Karuna Banarjee turn in one of the great performances of all time as perhaps the most maddeningly poignant cinema mom of all time. Give it an A minus. PS...Lest I forget, let's raise a sitar for Ravi Shankar's hauntingly beautiful score!

A film that so completely immersed me into India that in a small way, I felt like I had travelled there. The cinematography from Subrata Mitra is gorgeous, and I found both artistry and great humanism in Satyajit Ray's direction. He continues the story of Apu and his family with his coming of age and going off to college, wanting to do more than follow in his father's footsteps as a local priest. It's always heartwarming to see someone craving knowledge, especially when they've got to work so hard to get an opportunity rather than having it handed to them, and that's the case with Apu. Tension comes from his mother, who supports him but is devastated by the 'empty nest,' and both Ray and the two primary actors (Karuna Banerjee as mom and Smaran Ghosal as the older Apu) do a fantastic job of bringing out emotions that are poignant and universal. On top of everything he's learned in school, Apu learns an important lesson in life in scenes that hit like a hammer. Great film.

I was 14 when I watched "Aparajito" and I still remember weeping irrepressibly as the film eventually resonated in my heart and mind forever. Unarguably, the greatest film of all-time, its like a celestial creation. How humane a man can be, how perfect a man can be, how realistic a man can be.....I often think when I watch Satyajit Ray's films. I have seen masterpieces by Kurosawa, Federico Fellini, Bergman, Orson Welles, Michelangelo Antonioni and the likes, but Satyajit Ray's films stands so different and unique from them. How does he manage to craft such films? Aparajito is a universal film that celebrates human compassion and strive. A simple story, just like Pather Panchali, told with utmost perfection and craftsmanship, I have no words to describe this chef d'oeuvre. I believe anyone who is associated with cinema, directly or remotely, should watch this film at least once in their lifetimes. It is a kind of movie that will always stay with you forever.

Aporajito or The Unvanquishied is a little less important to me,an ardent fan of Satyajit Ray and his masterpiece Pather Panchali or The Song Of The Liitle Road as it somehow lacks the brilliant sparks of the first film of Ray.True,it has some moments of brilliance of the master filmmaker, like when Harihar dies or when Apu leaves home for Kolkata,yet somehow it fails to strike the cord.The difference of Apu's attitude while he goes for Kolkata the second time and he does not look back to wave his hands to his mother is also notable.But overall it is an ordinary story and quite banal.The acting skills of the protagonist Apu especially during his adolescent period is also far from being perfect.The pace is slow and unlike its first part you don't wait to see what happens next.However, the use of the sound of a train and Apu's attachment to it with the connection of his first sight of a train is brilliant.The story itself is ordinary and it is the director who salvages it a number of times.The death scenes become a routine in the end and you don't shed many tears in the most important death scene of the movie,i.e,Sarbojoya's death.Overall it is an average movie somehow over-hyped because of its creator.I would rather suggest you to watch Agantuk,one of Ray's most underrated movies yet one of his best works.

The second of the trilogy has Apu growing into an intellectual. He is a far from perfect son as he selfishly looks out only for himself. His mother is manipulative but she does have a point. She has supported his dreams after his father dies, but he only thinks of himself. His mother becomes I'll and he doesn't take time to visit her. What we have here is a poor child who gets a taste of education and runs with it. He is respected in his village but dreams of greater things. He manages to get by, but he lacks the discipline necessary to get his degree. The death of his father to some sort of ailment makes him aware of his own shortcomings. Still, he is a voracious learner but it is all sort of artificial until he is able to appreciate the sacrifices of those around him. He also learns the biggest lesson a boy can learn.

This is a sequel to a Pather Panchali. I did mot like the first film at all, I hoped this sequel will be a lot better and it was. The first half was very boring. Not much happened, but in the second half the story became much more interesting. Sadly, the film ended at what I thought was a middle of a story which felt as if it was just cut. I'm not sure what this film is supposed to mean. It truly felt like to be continued. I hope the third film will bring a true ending to the story.