Film Summary: Aparajito
(The Unvanquished)
Dir. Satyajit Ray,
1958
ONE * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
- Credits. Graphic: 1920 Benares, India.
- Ghats (long stone steps) along the Ganghes in Benares. Apu's father, a Brahmin, someone who reads the Hindu scriptures to peasants, finishes bathing and returns home. We see him with his wife in their humble apartment.
- First time we see Apu in the film. He is running through the narrow streets. He stays home for only a moment and then runs off again.
TWO * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
- A neighbor comes downstairs to the courtyard to see Apu's father. But only the mother is there. He gives her a new calendar. She seems afraid of him--and she pulls her hood over her face in the presence of another man.
- Apu's father offering sutras to the peasants. Apu runs around the area and spots a weightlifter. He watches him with interest.
- Apu's mother needs matches. She has Apu go upstairs and get them from the neighbor.
- Apu's father reciting sutras. He leaves with another man. They have tea at his apartment. As the man leaves, he confesses he is 100 rupees short of being able to pay for an arranged marriage. "What is life without a family?"
- Day of a big feast. Mom and Apu attend.
THREE * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
- Apu's father comes home late at night. He looks tired, sick. The next day the father comes down to the courtyard. He is going to work again. But later he collapses on the ghat.
- He is carried home. A doctor attends him. Meanwhile, we see Apu spending time alone--he is curious about a man getting water out of a well. Back at the compound, the neighbor comes downstairs, and Apu's mother is so afraid she holds her kitchen knife in front of her. The man backs away.
- Apu's father is still very ill. The mother sends Apu to fetch some water for him, and when he returns, and the mother tries to help him drink, the father dies suddenly. Cut to a flock of pigeons fluttering away from the rooftops as the music screams loudly.
FOUR * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
- Apu is 10. His mother consults with an uncle. He wants them to come and live with him. He tells her she can share in the reading of prayers for the family. Later, the mother sits at a cooking pot. Perhaps she is visiting the uncle. Elsewhere, Apu feeds the monkeys at a nearby temple in the country.
- Mom faces a decision. Should she go with her husband's family to Dewampur? She watches Apu in the garden. Camera moves in on her. There is an abrupt swish pan.
- On the train leaving Benares. Interesting focus on Apu's mother--not the boy. She goes to her uncle's home in the country instead of staying with a rich family.
- Apu's mother settles in with her new family. The great uncle begins to show Apu some of the rituals suitable for Brahmins. (NOTE: Apu's father was a Brahmin, and thus his son is born into the Brahmin caste.)
- Apu runs off to play with other children. Later, his mother speaks to him about his life here. Is he unhappy? He tells her he wants to go to school. But how to pay for the fees? Apu seems to think Mother will provide. She realizes she will have to dip into her savings.
FIVE * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
- School scene. A big day--visit by a VIP. The principal greets him, and they visit Apu's class, where Apu distinguishes himself by reading well and answering all the questions asked of him.
- Apu comes to the principal, who has noticed the boy's advancement. He wants Apu to improve his English. He gives him books to read.
- Apu shows off his learning to his mother. Later, the teenaged Apu comes in to the principal, who wants him to study in Calcutta.
- Now Apu goes to his Mother to see what she will say. She resents him leaving. Who will take care of her?
- After the argument, she goes outside after him and brings him back. She shows him her cache of savings. She will help him.
- The big day. Apu leaves for school.
SIX * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
- On the train to Calcutta. He arrives at the newspapers office where he has been sent to work.
- Having settled in, he writes Mother. Then we see him in class, then working in the press.
- One day he is kicked out of class for falling asleep. He and a friend go down to the river.
- Meanwhile, Mom carries on. Later Apu visits her when he is on school vacation. She lavishes food on him. "Tell me what you saw, what you heard!"
- At night she talks and talks to him. She begins to reveal her specific concerns, very private thoughts. But Apu has fallen asleep.
- Apu is bored at home. Soon he is ready to go. Later, he flops on the bed at night and pays no mind to his mother.
- The next morning he gets up early, leaves with barely a kiss, and heads for the station. At the station he buys his ticket and sits to wait. Back home his mother looks sad. Suddenly, he turns up again--realizing how much it matters to her to be with him during this short break. She cannot believe he has come back to her.
SEVEN * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
- More school scenes. He gets a letter from Mom. Please come home. He writes back that he can't come. Cut to the mother, who drops the letter. Camera up to show her sad face. A neighbor woman comes over and chatters. Mom is sicker in the next scene. She asks the woman not to write to Apu. He will come home if he wants to.
- Apu and friend chatting on the school grounds. Cut to sundial he made when he was at home. Camera moves down to show his mother sitting under a tree. She looks gravely ill. Suddenly she is heartened when she hears a train whistle in the distance. Her boy coming back? But no son. She barely can stand. She imagines Apu calling out to her. But he isn't there.
- At the press Apu's boss tells him he has a letter. It is from the neighbor, who tells him his mother is very sick.
- Apu rushes home on the train to be with his mother. He doesn't find her at the compound. He sees his great uncle standing nearby. He collapses in grief.
- The uncle asks him to stay and perform the sacred rites. And he wants Apu to stay on as a Brahmin priest. But the next morning Apu packs and returns to Calcutta. "I've got my exams," he tells his uncle. "And your mother's rites?" "I'll perform them in Calcutta. He leaves.
Copyright, Robert E. Yahnke, © 2001
Professor, General College, Univ. of Minnesota,
Reprinted by permission of the author
for educational use only