Given its status as a classic novel, The Home and the World was a tough story to adapt. The novel was written by India’s most revered writer Rabindranath Tagore, so the film has to honor the prose, and on top of that, it wrangles with the turbulent history of the early 20th century, the very same history that led to India’s revolution against colonial rule. Filmmaker Satyajit Ray was thankfully up to the task. Reintroducing the story generations later, the film beautifully depicts the marriage between traditionalist Bimala and her Western-education noble husband Nikhil, as well as her political liberation when she meets Nikhil’s more radical friend Sandip. Ghare-Baire masterfully grapples with that tug-of-war that changed India’s fate.
"When it comes to truthfulness about women’s lives, this great Indian moviemaker Satyajit Ray shames the American and European directors of both sexes."
— Pauline Kael
In the early 1900s, Nikhilesh, a wealthy Westernized Hindu in colonial East Bengal, feels compelled to test the love of his wife, Bimala. He introduces her to his friend Sandip, a politician agitating against British rule, and Bimala is equally taken with both Sandip's anti-colonial fervor and the man himself. Personal and political tensions subsequently flare as the now assertive Bimala has to make a crucial decision.
Nat. Board of Review
1 nomination
