Pather Panchali
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Movie Reviews of Pather Panchali
Movie Review: Essential
Summary: 5 Stars
Outstanding movie. DVD release not up to Criterion standards but the print quality is good.Movie Review: Good visual drama
Summary: 4 Stars
This film came recommended to me by several of my friends, so I felt compelled to see it. After watching the film, I am glad that I listened to them as this was a very good movie. Even though this is done with subtitles, I had no trouble following the story.
Although not really a draw back, this film is the first part of a trilogy, so the ending is more of a prelude to a beginning. The story is following a Brahmin family that has fallen on hard financial times. The ever optimistic father has trouble bringing enough money in to meet the needs of his family and keeping the ancestral home in good repair. Tragedy after tragedy besets them, which is the impetus for the ending of this movie (and beginning of the next).
In no part of this film did I have trouble following the filmmaker's work. The story kept me locked in and watching. I would highly recommend this film to others.
Movie Review: Still next best to the original movie
Summary: 4 Stars
No question about the fact that the effort that went into restoring the film is laudable. The DVD disappoints somewhat on a couple of counts. Firstly, if you want to watch it again with subtitles off, just to admire the visual compositions (in Ray's own words, there's no beautiful or ugly shots...only the right and wrong ones) that went into the storytelling, it doesn't let you do so. The subtitles, can, therefore be distracting. Secondly, there are loads of material written (a lot of it by Ray himself) and filmed (like interviews, especially the ones by Lindsay Anderson, and by Shyam Benegal/Govind Nihalani) with anecdotes of how the film was shot, and which could have been included in the DVD; such are material which make a DVD a truly collectible item. But really can't complain too much ... better something than nothing.Movie Review: Sony DVD of Poor Quality
Summary: 2 Stars
This cinematic masterpiece has been brought out on DVD by "Sony Pictures Classics" and is, unfortunately, of poor quality. While I've not seen the "Criterion Collection" version being offered here, I certainly hope it's better than the Sony. What it looks like the latter has done is merely transfer the VHS version onto DVD without any digital enhancements. What a pity to do this to so fine a film. Yes, one can still get a feel for the work's quality, but it certainly doesn't help viewing a diffuse, aged print.Movie Review: An amazing movie with a terrible DVD release.
Summary: 1 Stars
Pather Panchali (Satyajit Ray, 1955)
This would be a ludicrously long review before I ran out of good things to say about Pather Panchali. But everyone else has already said all those things. If you didn't listen to them, you're not going to listen to me, but I'll put in a "see it. now." here for good measure and get onto what will be a review not of a great film, but a ludicrous DVD release.
Biswas proudly trumpets that it has exclusive rights to Pather Panchali in the DVD market. If this is the case, it should be considered a crime against nature. The video transfer is horrible, the sound transfer only marginally better. I've seen better subtitling on bargain-basement bootleg Chinese DVDs. If your only chance to see the film is in the Biswas DVD release, wait until you can catch a revival somewhere. This is terrible in the extreme, and hopefully, someday, someone will do something about it. The movie gets four stars; the DVD release, one.