Pather Panchali

Subir Banerjee as Apu

One of the breakout hits of world cinema – a term that didn’t yet exist – Pather Panchali came seemingly from nowhere in 1955 and swept all before it. It remains a highly regarded film to this day, still featuring on Sight and Sound’s prestigious once-a-decade 100 Greatest Films of All Time list. In other words it’s one of those films you really ought to have seen if you’re going to hold your held high in the world of film buffery. It’s part of director Satyajit Ray’s Apu trilogy, along with Aparajito (1956) and The World of Apu (1959), the three films forming a Bildungsroman slab of biographical drama centred on the child … Read more