Satyajit Ray - Jalsaghar and Devi

Satyajit Ray shows the real Indian culture, traditions and ideas. All the movies have been true to time. They reflect the human condition in changing world, emotional impact of the social, economic and political changes in the lives of the characters. This provides a historical record of the transformation of India.

The simple portrayal of women cannot be overlooked. He has showed several shades of female characters. There is courage, simplicity, Bengali style, innocence and an unspoken strength. Ray shows the problems women faced in society and gives us idea what should be done about it. More than the dialogues any viewer is compelled to observe the movie.

The movies deceptively are simple but there is a deep underlying complexity of human emotions. His movies are relevant even today. In the movie Devi he examined the superstitions in the Hindu society. Devi is a forceful film in exposing the hypocrisy of the old elite through the zamindar father figure of village who dreams that his daughter in law is the reincarnation of the goddess. He makes her a public spectacle. When Daya’s father in law bestows the goddess image on her against her will and bends to touch her feet, she turns to the wall and scratches her nails. Her expressions shows self-pity, pain, shock and sorrow. Daya eventually becomes victim of her father in laws blind faith and loses not only her sanity but also her life.

Jalsaghar takes a pitiful view of the delusional zamindar whose music room is an imagined remnant of nostalgic past. The landlord Roy lives like a king, failes to notice the crumbling grandeur of his palace,  he loves to puff his hooka, spend time listening to music and putting up spectacles, draining away his ancestral wealth rather than handling zamindari.

On the one hand, Roy is snobbish, narcissistic, selfish, stuck in the past, stubborn, foolish, and proud. Only the accidental drowning of his wife and son put a stop to them, and even then it's only temporary. Roy is shown to be in the grip of pride. He can't stand the idea that his neighbor, Ganguli, whom he looks down upon, has not only become wealthy, but has had the audacity to start holding his own musical salons. Roy insists on holding the salons that have been bankrupting him precisely because his wounded pride compels him to try to keep up with Ganguli.

Ray also shows his protagonist to be a person of exquisite sensibility who acts as a kind of artist. Roy uses up his last few resources to create the visions that sustain his soul, rather than to buy the necessities that will sustain his body and extend his life so the chandelier as the closing shot justifies itself.