Film Review
The darkest and most controversial of Satyajit Ray's films,
Devi powerfully evokes the fallacy
of blind faith and shows the disastrous consequences that may ensue
from an overzealous, uncritical adherence to a belief system. At
the time of its release, the film was condemned in Ray's native India
as a flagrant attack on Hinduism, which it manifestly is not, although
it is easy to read an anti-religion subtext into the film. It is
not Hinduism (or indeed any religion) that
Devi attacks, but rather that
capacity which many believers have for wilful self-delusion - seeing
signs that are not really, being too willing to seek material
manifestations of a divine influence. With striking visual power
but extraordinary narrative economy,
Devi
shows what can go wrong when faith becomes subservient to superstition
in a society that is degenerating into decadence and spiritually barren
self-interest. Considered one of Ray's most important films, it was
nominated for the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival in 1962.
Devi also provides a stark
commentary on the way in which women in Indian society have been
repressed and controlled by social and religious conventions for
generations. At the time the film was made,
feminism was beginning to have an impact in India
(more noticeably in the workplace than at home) and Ray would return
to the subject of female repression, more overtly, in many of his subsequent films,
most notably
Mahanagar (1963) and
Charulata
(1964). Doyamoyee, the main character in
Devi, is an extreme representation
of a woman who has no control over her destiny but must allow herself
to fashioned (literally transformed into a goddess) by the most
influential male of her household (here, her stepfather). So
compliant is Doyamoyee to what is required of her that, in the end, she
herself believes in her divinity - her own will and personality have
been totally negated. Doyamoyee's sense of confinement and her
total lack of freedom are emphasised by the film's unremitting sense of
oppression, which is conveyed by the moody chiaroscuro photography and
the confined setting, which, seen from her perspective more resembles a
prison than a home. The gradual erosion of the young woman's
identity and her humiliating subjugation (which mirrors the dressing up
of a stone statue of the goddess in the opening credits) is one of the
most profoundly disturbing installments in Satyajit Ray's entire oeuvre.
Coming immediately after the third instalment of the acclaimed
Apu
Trilogy (the series of films that established Ray's
international reputation),
Devi
represents a dramatic change in style and subject matter for the
director. The striking naturalism of Ray's previous
near-autobiographical films is far less evident here and the tone is
much darker, with no trace of the humour and humanity that lightens
these early films.
Devi
is a far more introspective and contemplative work, one that takes us
into the darker places of the human soul, where the boundary between
reason and fanaticism is hopelessly muddled and the central
protagonists succumb to a kind of collective insanity, blinded by their
selfish desires to the extent that they can no longer judge where faith
ends and where wishful thinking takes over. It is telling that
whilst there is one rational person in the household (Doyamoyee's
educated husband Umaprasad), even he lacks the authority and the
self-belief to challenge the insane delusion that has taken hold of his
family, like a malignant illness. A chilling exploration of how
faith can be subverted for purely selfish ends,
Devi is one of Ray's bleakest and
most hauntingly lyrical films, and it continues to have a powerful
resonance more than half a century after it was made.
© James Travers 2012
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Next Satyajit Ray film:
Mahanagar (1963)
Film Synopsis
The setting is Chandipur, rural Bengal, India. The year is
1860. The aged widower Kalikinkar Roy lives in a grand
house with his two sons and their wives. A faithful servant of
the Hindu goddess Kali, Roy has a dream in which it is revealed to him
that his daughter-in-law Doyamoyee is the reincarnation of Kali.
With her husband Umaprasad away from home pursuing his studies,
Doyamoyee is unable to refute Roy's claims of her divinity and she
becomes a living deity. People come from far and wide to worship
her and take her blessings. Proof of her divinity comes
when a sick child placed in her hands suddenly regains
consciousness. On his return, Umaprasad is appalled at the fate
that has befallen his wife. Dismissing Roy's claims as hysterical
delusion, he attempts to run away with Doyamoyee, but in vain.
Convinced of her divinity, Doyamoyee knows that she must return to Roy
and fulfil her destiny. But when Doyamoyee fails to cure his
stricken grandson, Roy loses his faith in her...
© James Travers
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.