Mahapurush

Mahapurush / The Holy Man (1965) : Brief Review -

A socially important topic to expose religious fraudulent but Ray's one of rare Flabby works inviolable to his high standard. Mahapurush is second half of double features 'Kapurush-Mahapurush' which follows a completely different story. Kapurush was a lovestory which doesn't have anything that can bring social change but Mahapurush is about exposing racket of Imposter Saint which was definitely a very important topic for society. Now let me tell me you that Kapurush is a Classic but Mahapurush is not. Well, that doesn't mean the film is bad. Sometimes better content fails to impress as much as fictional and dramatic theories and that's what exactly the case here. A devout Hindu family falls victim to a charlatan posing as a holy man and then one of the educated and sensibile guy gathers a small team to expose the fraud baba without hurting the religious sentiments of people. Even though Mahapurush has a better content than Kapurush, it fails to come out as a Classic because of limited screentime and regular filmmaking features. However, Mahapurush is more interesting and more entertaining than any other Satyajit Ray film made by then. The faking lectures and fictional stories of Baba are fun to watch. Some scientific and mathematical references are there for educated audience and it's very likeable too. The cast members are quite good with their roles and the writing of the characters is also very nice and relatable to common men. The screenplay is engaging, the dialogues are fine and the cinematography is okay (pretty dark unreasonably). Satyajit Ray makes this film with the light theme which hadn't been done by him then, and so it can be called a worthy attempt to some extent. Overall, good but nothing great as we expect from the Great Filmmaker.

RATING - 6.5/10*

By - #samthebestest.

This is one of Ray's short stories. It lacks the intensity of his full-length features. Its a satire which appropriately captures the post-independence Indian zeitgeist. Its a sweet tale of how a charlatan is exposed with help from basic science and motivation from a lover boy in distress. Be it a short story or not, in every one of his movies, Ray has been a beacon by conveying his socially progressive ideas. He's a master at exposing the fault lines in the Indian society and delivering his wisdom packaged in a entertaining manner. I saw the movie in a combination pack with another one of his shorts - Kapurush. Kapurush is an emotion-packed drama. It captures the anxiety and rekindling of emotions of a chance meeting between two estranged lovers.

"Mahapurush: The Holy Man" is a decent little film, but I definitely should point out that it is little in scope and style. Satyajit Ray has taken one of his short stories and brought it to the screen. And, at only a little over an hour and a very simple plot, it seems pretty obvious that it was a short story. Because of this, the film is rather slight and I don't recommend it for folks not familiar with Ray's work, as he's done better and more amazing films. This one is more for someone wanting to see all of Ray's films--even the minor ones.

The film begins with a widower meeting a holy man on a train. Soon, the man is won over by the holy man and has convinced practically everyone in his family to become disciples of the guy and he comes to live with them. There is only one problem--he spouts nothing but hogwash and he's clearly a phony. For example, the guy claims to be older than the Buddha and Jesus AND that he told Einstein about the theory of relativity!! So how are the family's friends going to expose the truth? See the film and find out for yourself.

My biggest complaint about the film is much of the ending--which I found a bit vague and confusing. However, there are some nice character studies and the film is enjoyable. In many ways, this is like an Indian version of the old Moliere play, "Tartuffe".

On a railroad trip back home, a retired lawyer meets holy man Charuprakash Ghosh and falls under his spell. So does his daughter, which worries the young man who loves her. He investigates and soon becomes convinced he is a fraud.

Satyajit Ray's comedy credits an Indian writer as its source, but strikes me as owing a good deal to Moliere's TARTUFFE. Ghosh's babbling line includes being friends with all the great holy man of the past, and urging followers to achieve enlightenment by going onto the roof at noon and staring at the sun while they recite a prayer 972 times. I don't find this one of Ray's more compelling movies; the nonsensical things his con man continually says are arrant nonsense..... but that may be a reaction due to the fact that as a westerner, what he says makes no sense and is offensive. The offensiveness is probably deliberate on Ray's part, but makes the whole thing seem trivial.

(1965) The Holy Man/ Mahapurush (In Bengali with English subtitles) COMEDY DRAMA

Adapted from the story "Birinchi Baba" by Rajshekhar 'Parashuram' Basu, music, co-written and directed by Satyajit Ray that has popular spiritual leader, Birinchi Baba (Charuprakash Ghosh) and his sidekick, Kyabla (Rabi Ghosh) happened to share the same boxcar with a retired lawyer and his daughter, Buchki ((Gitali Roy) welcoming them to their home. It is there, is when things become complicated is when the daughter, Buchi were given instructions by the guru to stray far away from the student, Satya (Satindra Bhattacharya) who happen to take a liking to her. Once Satya and his peers begin to realize this, they then attempt to go to great lengths to expose the guru, Birinchi Baba and his sidekick for who they really are, as a fraud or as con men.

Saw this on TCM and was late at night after seeing Satyajit Ray's other movie "Devi" or "The Goddess", and although it was labelled as a comedy, I did not see a single thing I thought was funny. It was amusing but it could be the fact that I was kind of tired, despite spiritual con men is still happening today.