This Ray stands for Genius. Review on Satyajit Ray

Ever since DD National channel aired the Satyajit Ray film festival, I was hooked on to his movies. I watched whatever they had to offer and then rented in whatever was left. I was left dumbstruck by the depth of his movies. The effort put in, the intellect of the movies which used to stare at me right at my face everytime I watched any of the movies struck me with awe and left me all praises for the man.

Ray directed thirty-seven films, including feature films, documentaries and shorts. Ray's first film, Pather Panchali, won eleven international prizes, including Best Human Document at Cannes. Along with Aparajito and Apur Sansar, the film forms the Apu trilogy. Ray worked on an array of tasks, including scripting, casting, scoring, cinematography, art direction, editing and designing his own credit titles and publicity material. Apart from making films, he was a fiction writer, publisher, illustrator, graphic designer and film critic. Ray received many major awards in his career, including an Academy Honorary Award in 1992.

Satyajit Ray's ancestry can be traced back at least ten generations.Ray's grandfather, Upendrakishore Raychowdhury was a writer, illustrator, philosopher, publisher and amateur astronomer, and a leader of the Brahmo Samaj, a religious and social movement in 19th century Bengal. Sukumar Ray, Upendrakishore's son, was a pioneering Bengali writer of nonsense rhyme and children's literature, an able illustrator and a critic. Ray was born to Sukumar and Suprabha Ray in Kolkata. Sukumar Ray died when Satyajit was barely three, and family survived on Suprabha Ray's meager income. Ray studied economics at Presidency College in Kolkata, though his interest was always in fine arts.

In 1940, his mother insisted that he study at the Visva-Bharati University at Santiniketan, founded by Rabindranath Tagore. Ray was reluctant due to his love of Kolkata, and general low impression about the intellectual life at Santiniketan.His mother's persuasion and his respect for Tagore finally convinced him to try this route. In Santiniketan, Ray came to appreciate oriental art. He later admitted that he learnt much from the famous painters Nandalal Bose and Benode Behari Mukherjee on whom Ray later produced a documentary film, "The Inner Eye". With visits to Ajanta, Ellora and Elephanta, Ray developed an admiration for Indian art.

Ray had decided that Pather Panchali, the classic bildungsroman of Bengali literature, published in 1928 by Bibhutibhusan Bandopadhyay, would be the subject matter for his first film. This semi-autobiographical novel describes the growing up of Apu, a small boy in a Bengal village. Ray completed a treatment of the film on sea while returning to India from London.

In India, the reaction to the film was enthusiastic, The Times of India wrote that "It is absurd to compare it with any other Indian cinema [.] Pather Panchali is pure cinema".[11] In the United Kingdom, Lindsay Anderson wrote a glowing review of the film.[11] However, the reaction was not uniformly positive, and François Truffaut is reported to have said: "I don’t want to see a movie of peasants eating with their hands."[12] Bosley Crowther, then the most influential critic of The New York Times, wrote a scathing review of Panchali that the film's distributor Ed Harrison thought would kill off the film when it was released in the United States, but instead it enjoyed an exceptionally long run.

His work includes:

Bombaiyer Bombete(2003)(novel)(screenplay)(story)

Target(1995) Uttoran(1994)(also story)

. aka The Broken Journey Agantuk(1991)(screenplay)(story)

. aka The Stranger

. aka The Visitor(International: English title)

. aka Visiteur, Le(France) Goopy Bagha Phire Elo(1991)(story) Shakha Proshakha(1990)

. aka Branches de l'arbre, Les(France)

. aka The Branches of the Tree

Ganashatru(1989)

. aka An Enemy of the People(UK) Ghare-Baire(1984)

. aka The Home and the World Phatik Chand(1983)(also novel) Pikoor Diary(1981)(TV)

. aka Pikoo's Day Sadgati(1981)(TV)(dialogue)(screenplay)

. aka Deliverance(UK: subtitle) Heerak Rajar Deshe(1980)

. aka The Kingdom of Diamonds

Joi Baba Felunath(1978)(also novel)

. aka The Elephant God Shatranj Ke Khilari(1977)(dialogue)(screenplay)

. aka The Chess Players Jana Aranya(1976)

. aka The Masses' Music(USA)

. aka The Middleman Sonar Kella(1974)

. aka The Golden Fortress(USA) Ashani Sanket(1973)

. aka Distant Thunder(USA) Pratidwandi(1972)

. aka Siddharta and the City

. aka The Adversary The Inner Eye(1972) Seemabaddha(1971)

. aka Company Limited Sikkim(1971) Aranyer Din Ratri(1970)

. aka Days and Nights in the Forest(USA) Baksa Badal(1970)

Goopy Gyne Bagha Byne(1968)(screenplay)

. aka The Adventures of Goopy and Bagha Chiriyakhana(1967)

. aka The Zoo Nayak(1966)

. aka Nayak: The Hero(USA)

. aka The Hero Kapurush(1965)

. aka The Coward Charulata(1964)

. aka The Lonely Wife Mahanagar(1963)

. aka The Big City(USA)

. aka The Great City

. aka The Metropolis Abhijaan(1962)

. aka Abhijan(India: Bengali title)

. aka The Expedition Kanchenjungha(1962) Rabindranath Tagore(1961) Teen Kanya(1961)

. aka Three Daughters

. aka Two Daughters Devi(1960)

. aka The Goddess

Apur Sansar(1959)

. aka The World of Apu Jalsaghar(1958)

. aka The Music Room Aparajito(1956)

. aka The Unvanquished Pather Panchali(1955)

. aka Song of the Little Road(International: English title)

. aka Song of the Road

. aka The Lament of the Path

. aka The Saga of the Road Chinnamul(1950)(uncredited)

. aka The Uprooted

Writer, Director, Composer, Producer, Music Department, Sound Department, Miscellaneous Crew, Editor, Second Unit Director or Assistant Director .  he was a one man army and he received an Oscar for his lifetime achievement in 1992.

Words fail to describe that kind of an achiever.