The Big City (EOTWS)

End Of The Week Shorts #29 extract: The Big City (1963)

A beautiful film, and another masterpiece by Satyajit Ray, The Big City follows a wife of a struggling family into her first job as a saleswoman. And in such, this narrative encompasses, somewhat abstractly, an idea of a new-marriage or a re-marriage between a couple leading traditionally structured lives that are in jeopardy. This re-marriage re-defines the rules of their relationship and family life and its purpose is ultimately to reconcile a separating family in changing times - times defined by the developing cityscape around them. 

For the way in which this change, as represented by the microcosm of a middle-class family, is projected with perfect mise en scène, realist (though sometimes expressionist) direction and framing that exudes powerful photogénie through Madhabi Mukherjee's features alone, The Big City is a definite must-see and an unquestionable 'great' of world cinema.