The Cloud-Capped Star

For cinema club tomorrow, we are watching The Cloud-Capped Star (Meghe Dhaka Tara), directed by Ritwik Ghatak in 1960, is set during the aftermath of the partition of Bengal, an event that marked the director's life and work. A woman sacrifices herself for her ungrateful family as they struggle with the gap between the middle-class expectations of education and their poverty. Nita works to support her refugee family while the rest of them badger her for money every time she gets paid. The oldest son doesn't work because of his musical ambitions, and is constantly begging for money. The younger son wants new cleats for soccer; he quits school to work in a factory that wants him to play on its soccer team, but suffers a work accident. The younger sister steals Nita's boyfriend, whom she has also been supporting. The mother nags and chides. The father has had an accident that prevents him from working, but is also shown to be willing to overlook his daughter's plight. Nita works herself to the bone, coming down with TB. Eventually, though, the oldest has become a successful musical artist and is able to help out his family, but it is too late for Nita.  Filmed in expressionist black-and-white, the movie uses sound, music, and musical performances in ways that are both obviously meaningful to the uninformed viewer, and also deeply rooted in Indian musical traditions in ways that benefit from explanation. 

 

He also makes great use of natural sounds--birds, the train, sounds of cooking--but also symbolic sounds like the cracking of a whip, as at the end of this song.