Phatikchand (1983): The boy and the Juggler
Phatikchand (1983): The boy and the Juggler
Direction: Sandip Ray
Story, Screenplay, Music: Satyajit Ray
Many years ago, in Kolkata, a young boy saw a movie called ‘Phatik Chand’ which his dad took him to. The movie had a major impact on the boy because after Goopy Gyne Bagha Byne (The adventures of Goopy and Bagha) this was the next best children’s movie he had seen from filmmaker Satyajit Ray. Later he saw Ray’s other movies meant for children- Hirak Rajar Deshe (Kingdom of Diamonds), Sonar Kella (The Fortress) and Joi bab Felunath (The Elephant God) but Phatik Chand was etched permanently on his mind. He grew up discovering his love for movies, became a fan of Satyajit Ray’s works, read all his books, saw all his movies but still could not get a chance to see Phatik Chand for the second time. He somehow missed whenever it was played on TV. He searched everywhere in Kolkata but could not find a single copy because the movie was never released on a DVD. He searched for a review, a link about the movie but nowhere could he find any information including Satyajitray.org. He was disappointed and disheartened to see how underrated this beautiful movie was.
26 years later in Mumbai, he found the Phatik Chand DVD lying at BigFlix, the rental store. He was elated to discover that he was the first customer to rent it and rushed back home to see the movie with his sons.
Predictably, that boy was me.
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Phatik Chand is the directoral debut of Sandip Ray based on his dad, Satyajit Ray’s short novel by the same name. The film received an award in the International Children’s Film Festival in Vancouver.
The Story
The movie opens with a scene at astrologer’s office where four goons lead by Shyamlal (Biplab Chatterjee) asks the astrologer to recommend a shubhdin (auspicious date) as they are going to undertake a big job. The astrologer gives a date just 3 days away which makes Shyamlal apparently concerned. However he pays his fees and leaves.
Later, an 11 year old boy named Bablu (Rajib Ganguly), son of an affluent and aristocratic advocate dad (Haradhan Bannerjee), gets kidnapped by four goons, while he is returning from school. The gang led by Shyamlal, put him into a stolen Ambassador and travels towards Kaharagpur. When Bablu gains consciousness in the car, the thugs seem to be in an inebriated state including the driver. Driving on the dark highway, the driver loses his concentration and moments later, a truck rams the car head on. The truck driver drives away from the scene. The accident mangles the Ambassador killing the driver and one goon dies on the spot. Bablu gets thrown out on the street, and loses consciousness. Recovering from the shock, Shyamlal and his sidekick Raghunath checks unconscious Bablu and presuming he is dead, leaves the scene.
Bablu regains consciousness but discovers that he can’t recollect anything from his past, including his name. A gentleman volunteers to take Bablu for a medical check-up. Learning, he would be handed over to the cops, due to his childish fear Bablu flees towards the station following the sound of train whistle. On a Kolkata bound train he meets a wandering street juggler (Kamu Mukherjee), Harun-Al –Rashid, the self proclaimed badshah of juggling. Harun suspects something uncanny and tries to probe. On Asking his name, Bablu recollects ‘Phatik Chandra Paul & Sons’ from the calendar at the Doctor’s chamber and tells the same. Harun, though not convinced, follows his carefree instincts to take care of Bablu.
Harun organizes a day job for Bablu as a serving boy in a tea café. In weekends Bablu accompanied Harun to maidan (Central Green at Kolkata) where Harun shows his juggling tricks to earn his living. Bablu happily helps him works like an assistant to him. Gradually their bond grows stronger. One day Shyamlal & Raghunath visit the same tea café and spots Bablu and revives their kidnapping plan. They stalk Bablu but Harun discovers their motive. Shyamlal’s attacks the duo at maidan, but they manage to escape. While traveling on the taxi, Bablu regains his lost memory.
Meantime Bablu’s dad, impatient with the police’s inactivity, announces a cash reward. When Harun arrives to his posh mansion, Bablu’s dad gets furious to know Bablu was made to do petty job. Disgruntled, he insults Harun as selfish and greedy. Harun, a man with high self respect, retaliates and expresses his ignorance about the reward. The advocate refuses to believe, so Harun informs him about Bablu’s injury and leaves the house. Later the advocate repents his harshness, realizes Harun’s bigheartedness and as a redemption effort, sends Bablu to handover the cheque to Harun. Bablu somehow he makes it to Howrah station and catches Harun while he is about to leave for Chennai to join a circus. He offers the cheque, Harun refuses saying he can’t take money for taking care of his brother. He asks Bablu to look out for the circus to arrive at Kolkata and gives his juggling balls as a parting gift. The train leaves station, Bablu looks at the leaving train.
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My observations
I am not sure why I find myself to be attached so closely to this movie. May be it is associated with my childhood memories or it reminds me of yesteryears Kolkata (where I was born and brought up) or because of the sensitive script and memorable character performances. Ray’s book itself was very popular among kids as well as their parents. When the movie was made Sandip Ray could capture the essence of the book. Though, the obvious difference between reading about juggling and actually seeing it remain as complete different experiences.
The movie is a poignant story told in a minimalistic linear narrative. A handful of characters represented various social strata, professions and culture on 80’s Kolkata. The basic theme, like all other Ray’s works, is human relationship, which Sandip delivers with panache in his debut effort. Sandip had enough experience while working as assistant director to Ray since he was 22 and picked up many qualities of Ray’s style of storytelling.
Three of the actors have worked with Ray in his other films; Biplab Chatterjee (2 films), Kamu Mukherjee (2 films) and Haradhan (5 films). Kamu known as a method actor delivered an iconic performance on a negative role, in Sonar Kella. In Pahtik Chand he dominates with his powerhouse performance. It is a legend that, to play Harun’s character Kamu actually practiced and mastered juggling. Biplab’s portrayal as heartless crook Shyamlal is as good as it gets. Rajib as Bablu enacts a heart wrenching performance by his portrayal of an innocent boy in distress. Haradhan comes in only at two scenes in the movie but good enough to boost the conviction of the script.
Ray has always loved to snub fake spirituality, blind faith and the babaji culture. He has portrayed his stand in no lesser terms in Jai Baba Felunath (The Elephant God), Kapurush O Mahapurush (The Coward and the Holy Man) and a whole movie during later part of his carrier in Ganshatru (Enemy of the People). Ray used various elements to ridicule the superstition and spirituality, at time brutally. In Phatik Chand too, his disbelief in astrologic predictions are articulated by the accident on the same date recommended by the Astrologer. Later, when Shyamlal returns to the astrologer he mocks him by painting his face with ink and damages his office. Shyamlal’s action is a cinematic depiction of Ray’s stand on this aspect.
The movie beautifully captures the socio-economic essence of 80’s Kolkata. The astrologer’s fee is Rs 10. The bill of one omlette, toast and tea is Rs. 1.40 .A patron pays 10 paisa as tip which Bablu safe keeps in his pocket. The advocate reward of Rs 5000 was significant in those days. The maidan, the monument and the weekend crowd thronging to see the street games captures the simplicity of Kolkata life, in those laid back days of 80s. The Ambassador car plays an important role; many of the shots are taken while the character’s converse sitting on the spacious rear seats.
Bablu’s advocate dad represents the rich and sophisticated, whose larger than life ego prevents him to acknowledge the favour to someone belonging from lower social strata. On the contrary Harun, a nameless drifter is poor but rock-solid in character. He is an emblem of self-respect and affection. Harun doesn’t want a burden on him, but wants Bablu’s well being too. He doesn’t hesitate to make up a story to the tea shop owner, that Bablu is a helpless orphan and he need to be saved from his torturous uncle.
Any task when accomplished with passion transcends into a delightful experience. The close up shots of juggling by Harun’s guru with the Taj as backdrop with Ray’s mesmerizing music is a cinematic highlight and hints Sandip’s grasp on the medium.
Like typical Ray’s stories for children the script is devoid of any woman character. Ray probably kept the women characters away from children’s literature for the sake of simplicity.
This brilliant movie, till date remains one of the least discussed in public domain. Even, I had to add this movie to some of the relevant pages in wikipedia.
Phatik Chand, to me will remain one of the best human stories among Ray’s works for children with enough food for thoughts for adults to ponder.
The DVD by Shraddha video is available now.
Anurag Kashyap
Abhay Deol
Dibakar Banerjee
Hansal Mehta
Khalid Mohamed
Kundan Shah
Anish Kuruvilla
Jaideep Verma
Manish Gupta
Navdeep Singh
Bhavani Iyer
D. Santosh
Onir
Ashvin Kumar
Ramu Ramanathan
Sudhir Mishra
Pankaj Advani
Revathy
Saurabh Shukla
Shilpa Shukla
Sujoy Ghosh
Suparn Verma
Santosh Sivan
Shashank Ghosh
Shivajee
Pavan Kaul
Partho Sen-Gupta
Prroshant Naryannan
Sam Langoria
Satish Kasetty
@ uh: wow… so this was the gem u were talking abt having submitted through iView. u hv captured the essence of the story so succintly, and made me nostalgic abt kolkata at the same time…
honestly, i hvnt watched this movie, but now i plan to become a Big Flix member pronto…
@Satyendra: I am sure this is one of the most underated movie oa Ray (script, music, screenplay). IMDB, wiki, no where there’s any information. who knows…may be mine is the first review of this movie?
unfortunately i had read the book b4 watching da film…..and i found the subtle nuances which made the book a masterpiece was absolutely absent in the film….but i loved Kamu Mukherjee…as usual he was marvelously multilayered
unfortunately i had read the book b4 watching da film…..and i found the subtle nuances which made the book a masterpiece was absolutely absent in the film….but i loved Kamu Mukherjee…as usual he was marvelously multilayered
@ Sulakshana: Quite possible. I saw the movie first and was moved. But sonsidering it was a debut movie of a director, it was way ahead of its time, 26 years ago.
One interesting trivia i missed to mention: Shyamlal listens to the radio on the car which plays the song “Aap jaise koi mere zindegi me aaye” from ‘Qurbani’. It was quite unusual to refer to a mainstream Hindi movie in a Ray movie
@udtahaathi..thanks for info..would see this one for sure..they dont make films like this anymore…details that you pointed would make it all the more interesting viewing…
@Ram V: Right. This film is just another example how good films die in our country, unnoticed.
uh- this is definitely on my list of movies to be watched.Thanks to the Feluda series with Bombaiyer Bombete,Kailashey Kelenkari,Tintorettor Jishu Sandip Ray seems to be finally getting his due.
I read the book before I saw the movie, and have to agree with sulakshana. The movie had a good script, but the direction was plain shoddy. It could go nowhere near the brilliance of the story.
And Sandip Ray. This man has been successful in making a career out of adapting his father’s stories as “Satyajit Ray”, the brand name, sells like anything in bengal.
Mediocre films like Bombaier Bombete, Kailashe Kelenkari, Tintoretor Jishu profited solely for the brand name whereas his own endeavors sank without a trace. He is killing Feluda with that ridiculous caste(Bibhu as jatayu is the pinnacle of bad casting) and addition of atrocious “original” plotlines for the sake of modernization. Why we cant have a feluda film set in ’70s & ’80s i.e. where it originally belongs? Why it is important that feluda should use a mobile phone? Ray would have written a different plot in the age of mobile & internet. Why fiddle with that? It is as ridiculous as adapting Sherlock Holmes in 21st century and making him to use a GPS to track Moriarty.
I seriously believe that like batman, the Feluda franchise urgently needs a reboot with better caste and director. But who will do it? Sandip is unstoppable.
UH
Kudos for this fabulous review of a timeless classic from the Ray Father-Son duo.
Satyajit Ray’s brilliance lay not only in the way he conceptualised and captured the subtle nuances of human relationships on celluloid, but also in the delicate choice of characters and the way he portrayed them. Sandip has had his flashes of brilliance, and Fatikchand is a glowing example of Satyajit Ray’s profound influence over his son’s methods of cinematographic execution of the subject.
@Sethu: Well I am not sure whether Phatik Chand can be compared with any of Sandip’s later films. Unfortunately, Sandip could not deliver much to our expectation in his long career.
@Roodrow: Comparing a movie with the book always runs the risk of being judgemental. Phatik Chand as book would always offer a different charm because of Ray’s outstanding storytelling talent. I am not discussing the book here. I don’t know when you have seen the movie. I saw it on 1983 and comparing with the standards of those days, it was quite ahead of its time. That time only a few children’s movies were made and mostly were made in ancient times on rural themes- Ramer Sumati (1947), Badi Theke Paliye (1958), and Joy ( late 70s), those are only few I recollect to be memorable. Then Ray came out with his path-breaking GGBB (1968). So what I am saying, if you respect the era the film was made, there’s was no comparable with it.
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Now, regarding Sandip’s Direction. I am not an expert on the art of filmmaking, but I did observe few details on this movie which, on those times, were quite advanced.
The casting was perfect. No one could play the roles like Kamu & Haradhan did.
There are lots of out door shooting in fact 80% of the movie is shot outdoors. There are shots inside moving Taxi (and not showing a screen behind the windscreen), moving train done quite contextually and convincingly.
The scenes and conversations at the astrologers office were interesting.
The accident shot was good.
The juggling shots were exceptionally good. Especially, the one with Harun’s guru with Taj Mahal at back-drop is outstanding.
The bird’s eye shots of maidan from monument were exclusive.
I am sure people who are more knowledgeable than me on the art, can throw more light on other aspects too.
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Unfortunately, even being the assistant director to Ray for many years he did not improve with time. His TV series ‘ Satyajit Ray presents’ was still acceptable. But I agree, with GGBB Phire Elo and later his feluda movies are just bad. After Santosh Dutta no one can play Jatayu because the character was created for him ( Ray and Santosh Dutta were neighbours in Gorpar Road).
It’s dad to note after Ray no one could do justice to Feluda as Basu Chatterjee did to Byomkesh. I concur with your frustration.
@S. Chakravarty: Well summarized. Unfortunately, Sandip could not sustain the quality and with time the sparks seems to have died down. There’s are still so much potential left to make amazing Sci-Fi series with Prof Shonku, I wonder why no director is taking them up. One fine day an International Project would start and we would start our slumdogian crying and cribbing.
segregate it as a film…..don’t mind about the tag it carries….roorow has good points raised…..and plz its criminal to compare Baari Theke Paliye with the film Phatikchand…..
@ ~uh~
Agree with you. But I felt the quality of fatikchand has to do more with ray’s screenplay rather than Sandip’s direction. Still i have to admit that it is more watchable than any of his other works. But I dont understand why other directors in bengal are not interested in doing feluda film. is it a kind of copyright thing that Sandip holds?
@ Sulakshana: Well. Which Bengali movie would you rate as abetter children’s film in 80’s ?
@Roodrow: I lack formal training and thus probably not that competent to dissect a film and might confuse between Direction & screenplay.The point is the movie is not that bad to have zero reviews/ information on public domain.
Copyright ? Probably yes.
After Soumitra it’s difficult to visualize anyone (Sabyasachi is a misfit in my view)as Feluda.
For that matter Ray’s another character Tarinikhudo can be transformed into brilliant children adventure films.
As I said most of us are less doer and more Slumdog cribber.
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editor’s note – yayaver…plz dont put links for illegal downloads.
Discovery: The full movie in Bengali (without subtitles) can be watched in Youtube here in parts.
Your write-up on Phatikchand was good. I was taken to Purna cinema with family. Children waited outside because Pikoor Diary, an adult film by Ray was getting shown before Phatikchand. Pikoo and Phatikchand got released and shown together-one after another.Like you I have fond remembrance of Phatikchand.Thank you for reliving them.
Biswa,
Thanks for coming back here.
I remember watching Pikur Diary before Phatikchand too.
Btw am looking for Pikur Diary, but seems it was never released on DVD :(