''Strir Patra'' (also ''Streer Patra''; English: ''A Wife's Letter'') is a 1972 Bengali film, directed by

Purnendu Patri Purnendu Patri (sometimes Anglicised as Purnendu Pattrea) (2February 193119 March 1997) was an Indian poet, writer, editor, artist, illustrator, and film director. He was best known for his poems and stories, particularly for his poetry collec ...

, based on a short story by

Rabindranath Tagore Rabindranath Tagore (; bn, রবীন্দ্রনাথ ঠাকুর; 7 May 1861 – 7 August 1941) was a Bengali polymath who worked as a poet, writer, playwright, composer, philosopher, social reformer and painter. He resh ...

, and with

Madhabi Mukherjee Madhabi Chakraborty (''née'' Mukherjee; born 10 February 1942) is an Indian actress. She won the National Film Award for Best Actress for her performance in the Bengali film '' Dibratrir Kabya''. She has acted in some of the most critically a ...

playing the lead role. Tagore's story, first published in 1914, is considered to be a path-breaking feminist text. The film won the

National Film Award for Best Feature Film in Bengali The National Film Award for Best Feature Film in Bengali is one of the National Film Awards presented annually by the Directorate of Film Festivals, the organisation set up by Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, India. It is one of several ...

, as well as a number of BFJA Awards.

Plot

Tagore's story is written in epistolary form - the letter from the wife forms the entire text. The film uses the letter as a frame for the narrative. It tells the story of Mrinal (

), a young woman from a poor family, married into an aristocratic joint family of

Calcutta Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , List of renamed places in India#West Bengal, the official name until 2001) is the Capital city, capital of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of West Bengal, on the eastern ba ...

. She is chosen as a bride because of her beauty. However, it is her intelligence that turns out to be the key factor in the story. Women in the family lead a life that is confined to the kitchen and the bedroom. Mrinal's sister-in-law (Smita Sinha) accepts the system unquestioningly. Mrinal is different; she takes an independent stance on several domestic matters, and secretly writes poetry. Her daughter dies soon after birth. Mrinal's life changes when Bindu (Rajeshwari Roychowdhury), her sister-in-law's sister, comes to stay. The family is not happy at this development. They treat Bindu like an unpaid servant, with Mrinal alone standing up for her. To get rid of the problem, the men force Bindu into an arranged marriage, and even her sister considers this to be the best solution. However, Bindu's husband (Nimu Bhowmick) turns out to be mentally unstable and violent. Once again, Bindu seeks shelter with her sister. Now, however, the situation has become untenable, and Bindu commits suicide. Meanwhile, Mrinal has managed to get permission to go on a pilgrimage to Puri with relatives. Through these tragic events, she has come to realise that women have no freedom in a patriarchal society. Standing on the seashore at Puri, she makes up her mind, and writes a letter to her husband declaring that she would never return to their house.

Cast

—Mrinal * Rajeshwari Roychowdhury—Bindu * Nimu Bhowmick—Bindu's husband *

Santosh Dutta Santosh Dutta (Bengali: সন্তোষ দত্ত; 2 December 1925 – 5 March 1988) was a Bengali actor, best known for playing the character of Jatayu in Satyajit Ray's Feluda movie series ''Sonar Kella'' and '' Joi Baba Felunath''. Ear ...

—Doctor * Asim Chakraborty * Smita Sinha—Mrinal's sister-in-law *

Rudraprasad Sengupta Rudraprasad Sengupta (born 31 January 1935) is a Bengali Indian actor, director and cultural critic. Biography Sengupta was born in Calcutta (now Kolkata), Bengal, the son of Anant Sengupta and Usha Prabha Sengupta. He studied at the Scottish ...

* Ayan Bandyopadhyay

Crew

* Direction -

* Screenplay - Purnendu Patri * Music - Ramkumar Chatterjee * Cinematography - Shakti Banerjee * Art direction - Purnendu Patri * Editing - Arabinda Bhattacharyya

Production

Casting

The choice of

to play the lead role was perhaps automatic, given her stellar performance as a Tagore heroine in

Satyajit Ray Satyajit Ray (; 2 May 1921 – 23 April 1992) was an Indian director, screenwriter, documentary filmmaker, author, essayist, lyricist, magazine editor, illustrator, calligrapher, and music composer. One of the greatest auteurs of fil ...

's ''

Charulata ''Charulata'' (Spelt as ''Cārulatā''; ) is a 1964 Indian drama film written and directed by Satyajit Ray. Based upon the novel ''Nastanirh'' by Rabindranath Tagore, it stars Soumitra Chatterjee, Madhabi Mukherjee and Sailen Mukherjee. The ...

''. Apart from her and

, who were well-known in Bengali cinema, the cast of the film included several prominent stage actors such as

, who was with the theatre group

Nandikar Nandikar ( bn, নান্দীকার) is a theatre group in India. The group has its headquarters in Kolkata Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , the official name until 2001) is the capital of the Indian state of West Be ...

and would later become its leader, and Asim Chakraborty, who had set up Chaturmukh theatre group.

Shooting

Purnendu Patri not only wrote the screenplay for the film, but also handled the art direction. The film was shot on location in Dhurjati Dham, an iconic old building in North Calcutta (now declared a heritage building), which had earlier been used by Satyajit Ray for ''

Jalsaghar ''Jalsaghar'' ( bn, জলসাঘর ''Jalsāghar'', "The Music Room") is a 1958 Indian Bengali drama film written and directed by Satyajit Ray, based on a popular short story by Bengali writer Tarasankar Bandyopadhyay, and starring Chhabi Bis ...

''.

Music

The choice of

Ramkumar Chattopadhyay Ramkumar Chattopadhyay (1921 — 18 March 2009) was an eminent Bengali singer, composer and music director. He was well known as a classical singer with a unique repertoire of ''Puratani'' (old Bengali) songs, devotional songs and Tappa. Early lif ...

as Music Director was an unusual but appropriate one. Chatterjee had not composed music for films prior to ''Strir Patra'', but was well known as a classical singer with a unique repertoire of ''puratani'' (old Bengali) songs.

Awards

* Twentieth National Film Awards:

* Tashkent Film Festival: Award for Best Direction * International Film Festival of India, 2011: Selected for screening in the section "Classics from Tagore" * BFJA Awards 1974 ** Best Indian films ** Best black-and-white cinematography - Shakti Banerjee ** Most outstanding work of the year - Ayan Bandyopadhyay

References

External links

* {{National Film Award Best Feature Film Bengali 1972 films Bengali-language Indian films Films set in Kolkata Films based on works by Rabindranath Tagore Indian black-and-white films Films about women in India Best Bengali Feature Film National Film Award winners 1970s Bengali-language films