This film about a woman’s artistic and romantic yearning by Satyajit Ray is set in late nineteenth-century, pre-independence India.
It takes place in the gracious home of a liberal-minded, workaholic newspaper editor and his lonely, stifled wife, Charulata (Madhabi Mukherjee), whose exquisitely composed features mask a burning creativity.
When her husband’s poet cousin comes to stay with them, Charulata finds herself both inspired by him to pursue her own writing and dangerously drawn to him physically.
Based on a novella by the great Rabindranath Tagore, Charulata is a work of subtle textures, a delicate tale of a marriage in jeopardy and a woman taking the first steps toward establishing her own voice. —The Criterion Collection
Berlinale (Competition): Best Director, OCIC Award, New York, Locarno (Sections Spéciales Hommage à Satyajit Ray), Berlinale (Retrospective), Abu Dhabi (Special Programs), Locarno (Open Doors: Satyajit Ray), Cannes (Cannes Classics)
Read about this film
Title: The Lonely Wife | Charulata (1964)
Directed by: Satyajit Ray
Date of birth: 2 Maj 1921, Calcutta, India
Date of death: 23 April 1992, Calcutta, India
Writing credits:
Satyajit Ray, Rabindranath Tagore
Music by: Satyajit Ray, Kishore Kumar
Country: India
Language: Bengali | English
Color: Black and White
Runtime: 118 min.