A Reading of Satyajit Ray's Pather Panchali and Agantuk as Subtexts of Fictional Ethnography

Abstract

This essay focuses on Pather Panchali (Song of the Little Road, 1955) and Agantuk (The Stranger, 1991) and discusses the style of Satyajit Ray’s filmmaking which combined the aesthetics of European verisimilitude with suggestive symbolism based on conventional Indian iconography. The paper will concentrate on the authentic representation of a poor family in rural Bengal in Pather Panchali and the urban setting, in his last film Agantuk. The main aim is to explore how the detailing of the shots and the dialogues in these films engage in the ethnographic study of the Bengali society through these cinematographic fictional narratives.