Himghar

Recently I saw HIMGHAR (Frozen Home), a 1996 film on YouTube. I have always felt that Sandip Ray remains an under-appreciated filmmaker in Bengali cinema. People associate him mostly with Feluda films. Yet he has made fine films when he tried his hand in various genres. His works like Phatikchand, Uttoron, Jekhane Bhooter Bhoy, Himghar & Monchora tells us that he is adept at tackling different themes.

HIMGHAR feature a protagonist who was a revolutionary once but thereafter abandoned the fight and the struggle to settle down to a lower middle-class existence driven by family compulsion. A particular Ranjit Da (Deepankar Dey) is a well-wisher of the family and has risen to the higher echelons in the corporate world. Political rivalry at the workplace where our protagonist work upset him as he too could be subjected to questioning over the passage of certain business deals that required his approval ...

This work is a sensitive exploration of several themes dogging the have and the have-nots of society and touches upon issues of moral turpitude and abortion, to mention a few. Gopa Aich, Anoop Kumar, Anil Chatterjee, Dhritiman Chatterjee, Dilip Roy and others feature in the cast.

Ratings: 4/5.