La nuit Bengali

I accidentally stumbled upon this film. I didn't know there was a movie based on one of my favourite books. I read the book twice, and i could still read it a hundred times.

The film is very succinct, presents the main events, but shows very little of the feelings and inner thoughts of the characters, and of the Indian culture and philosophy. The book is much more introspective, deep and painful to read. The book is based on a true story. Mircea Eliade (Allan in the book/movie), a very famous Romanian philosopher (who also wrote the first History of Religions) travels to India in order to discover its culture. There he meets the love of his life, Maytreyi (Gaytri) but the cultural gap between western and eastern civilization gets in their way. The romance ends very badly, leading the two to extreme sufferance.

After many years, Maytreyi and Eliade both become very important writers, and they accidentally meet at a conference. After this event, Maytreyi writes a book with her side of the story.

I liked the casting very much of this movie, but the director could have done much more justice to such a painful romance.