One evening in August during the Japanese summer, all the seats in a mid-sized theater in Tokyo looked occupied. The audience listened with rapt attention to a woman sitting on the stage, with a movie screen behind her. Obviously, this isn’t just another screening, but the topic can’t be called common in this part of the world either. The woman on stage is discussing “Rabindrasangeet,” set against the backdrop of master-director Satyajit Ray’s 1964 masterpiece “Charulata,” one of seven films screened in Japan last year as part of a retrospective of his work.The line-up included “Jalsaghar” (1958), “Mahanagar” (1963), “Charulata” (1964), “Kapurush”, “Mahaprush” (both 1965), “Nayak” (1966) and “Jai Baba Felunath” (1979) – first released in Japan and spanning two decades of some of Ray’s most memorable films. The films are also available on video on demand and home video with Japanese subtitles. Demand continues to grow and the films are set to be released on Blu-ray in March.However, to filmmaker and Ray’s son Sandeep Ray, none of this comes as a surprise. After all, Japanese film master Akira Kurosawa once said: “Having not seen the films of Satyajit Ray is equivalent to living in a world without seeing the sun and the moon.” Sitting in his residence on Lake Temple Road in Kolkata, he recalls the role of Japanese distributor Toho-Towa Co. Ltd, founded in 1928 by film pioneer Nagamasa Kawakita, and says that Kawakita’s wife, Koshiko Kawakita, was an admirer of Ray.
“She was very close to our family and was a die-hard follower of Satyajit from the beginning,” he said. When Ray first visited Japan in 1966, it was Kenko who arranged the meeting between Ray and Kurosawa. “I think they distributed all of my dad’s movies in Japan up until the eighties. They must have done very well. Otherwise, why would she be asking about new movies every year?” said Sandeep Rai.The seven restored films began showing at Le Cinema Bunkamura in Tokyo on July 25. The retrospective was originally scheduled to last three weeks, but an additional week was added due to demand. “These films are being shown not only in Tokyo but also in cities like Hiroshima, Osaka, Kyoto, etc., covering 15-20 cinemas across the country,” said Varsha Bansal, who is in charge of restoring Ray’s classics produced by her grandfather RD Bansal.Screenings are combined with discussions and lectures. If film researcher and producer Eri Morinaga spoke after “Mahanagar,” then Asian film researcher Tamaki Matsuoka spoke after the screening of “Jalsaghar.” “Rabindrasangeet” performer and Bengali lecturer Yuka Okuda moderated a session after the screening of “Charulata”. “I have some thoughts on the impact of Rabindranath Sangeet in the film...Some viewers expressed a desire to watch the film again. This makes us realize that Ray’s film is a profound and magnificent creation. ” Okuda told TOI.