Abar Aranye

Lovers of Ray's film should avoid this film if at all possible. It was maybe a good idea to get the surviving cast of DAYS AND NIGHT IN THE FOREST back together again and invent a story for them. But this is very poor: it is full of inconsequential moments, pointless dialogue, seemingly-randomly-chosen songs, awkward melodrama, clumsy political interjections and nonsensical plot-developments. It is rambling, unfocused and overlong and really quite boring. The only good thing is that the film magnifies and amplifies what made Ray so great; his subtlety, deftness and grace are completely lacking here, and so we look back with longing; if only Ray were still making films...

This movie would be bad enough even if Goutam Ghose had spared the viewers his opinions on ultra-leftist rebels and the clash of civilisations. That included, this movie is a disaster.

Tabu's dialogues seem to be wooden and insincere. Shubhendu doesn't have a clue to what he is required to do. In fact, most characters and their contrast to their young selves (probably the whole point of making the sequel) are sketched very shabbily. The travel to North Bengal by road is given too much of screen time.

I watched this movie just after watching Ghose's 'Paar', and the difference was startling.

This movie was shown in UC, Berkeley on 14th February,2004. The movie was part of bengali initiative taken in UC, Berkeley..movie started with a brief introduction from the producer of the movie and ended with a discussion by Prof. Ganguly(?). During the discussion phase it was revealed that the audience and the critic didn't like the movie much. They compared it to original make of "Aranyer Din Ratri" and rated this as an inferior movie.

However, I liked it despite of its weaknesses.

Forest life is very different in India. The middle (and upper) class people go there for a break in their life, try to get away from their regular life. But they don't connect very well to forest. They disturb the balance of forest, the poor people who live in nearby places. this is what displayed very artistically in "Aranyer Din Ratri" by Satyajit Ray.

This movie being the continuation of "Aranyer Din Ratri" didn't say it so mildly. Its loud, its even disturbing to many of us. So we didn't like it much.

At the same time, movie is not so well made..there are many weaknesses..there are many characters, too many compared to "Aranyer Din Ratri". In particular, I didn't like the acting of Sharmila Tagore and Tabu...they should have been replaced by more prominent actresses.

It seemed to me that Ghosh (director) made a protest against "Aranyer Din Ratri". Forest is not a place where people should go to enjoy their past time..you are unfit to go to forest, if you can't connect well.

There are also isolated scenes in the movie what one can't connect very well. This is a common complain I heard from the movie viewers. To me it was deliberate attempt by the director! It was a movie of strong protest!

Few things I didn't like about the movie:

1. Tabu playing so much time with the doll! I know many girls at that age do it, but its so boring!

2. Manager's wife in forest bunglow and their kid..unnecessary characters in the movie...didn't serve any purpose.

3. Memory game looked rather boring this time..could have reduced the time a bit!

and so on....its pointless to write more negatives since I liked the movie overall.

Som.

All the sensibility, artistry, rare inter & intra personal chemistry & lastly the Superior , sophisticated & sublime presentation of the original movie is completely destroyed by these so called intellectual geniuses of today Bengali cinema, desperate to open the veil of the hypocrisy of the city life people & presenting tabbu as a symbol of director's intellectual masturbation. Extraneous effort to create usual humor surely make u heel crying ....In India, it becomes so easy to put dirty hands in masterpiece like aranyer din ratri......No chemistry is there between characters...no story...no flow.....nothing interesting.......& why the hell there is classical European style background score?????don't understand any taste or purpose of the disaster that is created..........And Lastly, the thought that kept me wondering is when they edit their intellectual visuals with the magic ray had created, do they feel that it looked utterly irritating, mediocre & hugely disturbing????!!!!.....everyone is trying to reinvent "Charulata", "Aranyer Din Ratri" & "Apu Trilogy".....where hardly they are capable even to produce a material worth watching!!!

There are several drawbacks of the movie. There is only one good point, you will like it when the old "Aranyer Dinratri" is recalled on screen.

Tabu is a horrible bangla speaker. Her dialogue is so heavily accented that keeps you wondering what the hell is she doing here? There are too many songs and most of them are not edited properly.

Cinematography is worse than a regular steady-shot handy cam. There is no solid story frame to build the moments on. Everything is haphazard.

Too many characters in the film, and most of them are so artificial. Before becoming comfortable with the cast on the screen, the director keeps adding new characters and the plot keeps becoming more and more unstable. Seems like the director suggested the crew to just be themselves, but nobody had any idea about what he/she is doing. It is painful to watch. So beware of it.