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Outsider Pictures is bringing the critically acclaimed Indian Bengali-language film “Manikbabur Megh” (“The Cloud and the Man”) to U.S. shores on Aug. 9.

The film, which has been making waves in Bengal since its July 12 theatrical release, will initially open in Chicago and San Jose.

Directed by newcomer Abhinandan Banerjee, the film tells the story of Manik, a loner in Kolkata who forms an unlikely bond with a cloud. The narrative explores themes of loneliness, connection and transformation.

The film stars Chandan Sen in the lead role, supported by an ensemble including Debesh Roy Chowdhury and Bratya Basu.

“The Cloud and the Man” has attracted considerable attention on the international festival circuit, screening at over 25 festivals including Tallinn Black Nights, Hong Kong, Edinburgh and Santa Barbara. It has also collected several awards, including the Netpac Award for Best Asian Film at the Kolkata International Film Festival.

Paul Hudson of Outsider Pictures said,...

by Rwita Dutta

Celebrating messiahs from the underbelly of any society is nothing new. Nevertheless, there has been a serious dearth of noir films in the history of Bangla cinema. Every time the city is seen in cinema, it remains visually stunning. Yet, surprisingly, the underdogs are carefully swept under the carpet. Under the project of the beautification of the city, there has been no place for slums, everyday violence, brothels and other kinds of chotoloks (downtrodden). Yet, without them, the State and the bhodrolok community, who write the history of any decade from above, would be a sham. Bratya Basu's “Hubba” (Don/ 2024/133mns) depicts the life and rise of Hubba Shyamal aka Bimal (his screen name) and the volatile nexus of politics within the underworld. In other words, it is a biopic on the notorious gangster Hubba Shyamal in the 1990s Hooghly, played by popular Bangladeshi actor Mosharraf Karim.

It’s a tough game of survival in Calcutta, a city which keeps its people in their same old spaces with the same-same job opportunities, with little to no chance to change their lives for the better. For those few brave who try to challenge the rules of the societal game in Aditya Vikram Sengupta’s drama “Once Upon a Time in Calcutta”, things don’t go all too well. Ela (Sreelekha Mitra) gets punished for being born out of a wedlock as a daughter of a wealthy, married man and the city’s once-upon-a-time big performance star. She can’t be included to the inheritance, and her half-brother Bubu (Bratya Basu) is still sulking about his father’s infidelity four decades later, blocking her chances of getting the fair share out of the sale of the family house where he still lives alone, locked behind the barred door. Raja...

It’s a tough game of survival in Calcutta, a city which keeps its people in their same old spaces with the same-same job opportunities, with little to no chance to change their lives for the better. For those few brave who try to challenge the rules of the societal game in Aditya Vikram Sengupta’s drama “Once Upon a Time in Calcutta”, things don’t go all too well. Ela (Sreelekha Mitra) gets punished for being born out of a wedlock as a daughter of a wealthy, married man and the city’s once-upon-a-time big performance star. She can’t be included to the inheritance, and her half-brother Bubu (Bratya Basu) is still sulking about his father’s infidelity four decades later, blocking her chances of getting the fair share out of the sale of the family house where he still lives alone, locked behind the barred door. Raja...

Sales

U.S. sales agent Outsider Pictures has boarded Abhinandan Banerjee‘s Indian film “The Cloud & the Man” (Manikbabur Megh), while European sales agent The Open Reel is on board Joan Gómez Endara‘s Colombia/Panama project “The Red Tree.” Both films are in the first features competition at the 25th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival, where they will have their world premieres.

“The Red Tree” is a road movie that tells a story about three people at very different stages of life. It is produced by Sonia Barrera, Joan Gómez Endara and Viviana Gómez for Big-Sur Película. The cast includes Carlos Vergara, Shaday Velasquez and Jhoyner Salgado.

“The Cloud & the Man” revolves around a lonely middle-aged man whose dull life changes when he notices a cloud in the sky that seems to follow him all the time. It is produced by Bauddhayan Mukherji and Monalisa Mukherji for Little Lamb Films...

It’s a tough game of survival in Calcutta, a city which keeps its people in their same old spaces with the same-same job opportunities, with little to no chance to change their lives for the better. For those few brave who try to challenge the rules of the societal game in Aditya Vikram Sengupta’s drama “Once Upon a Time in Calcutta”, things don’t go all too well. Ela (Sreelekha Mitra) gets punished for being born out of a wedlock as a daughter of a wealthy, married man and the city’s once-upon-a-time big performance star. She can’t be included to the inheritance, and her half-brother Bubu (Bratya Basu) is still sulking about his father’s infidelity four decades later, blocking her chances of getting the fair share out of the sale of the family house where he still lives alone, locked behind the barred door. Raja...

by Rwitta Dutta

The citation of the jury arrived and it declared the reason behind the prestigious award received by the Indian film, Dictionary (Bengali/2021/ 110 minutes) in the recently concluded Nepal International Film Festival, 2021. The illustrious jury members unanimously cited the deliberation before submitting their verdict. They thought Dictionary was the “delicate depiction of a slice of the contemporary Indian society portrayed with warm humour and critique of the substitution of cultural values”.

A short stint with the director Bratya Basu revealed that it was the vulnerability of marital and familial relationships that attracted his attention to make the film. Inspired from two short stories,Baba howa (becoming a father) and Swami howa (becoming a husband) by the renowned Bengali writer Buddhadev Guha, this film germinated in Basu’s mind slowly and quite imperceptibly.Basu felt that institutions were not beyond question but institutions could not always be seen and judged sceptically.

Love is sometimes an amazing journey that touches hearts and reflects the emotional quotients of human mind in an abstract or realistic manner. But love cannot be a pseudo-wrapper on the remiss vessels of loveless couples. And that’s exactly where director Suman Mukhopadhyay fails to portray his feelings and has made “Asamapto” really a damp squib with a thoughtless narrative.

The story of “Asamapta” is derived from the novel “Aschorjo Bhraman”, written by famous Bengali novelist Shirshendu Mukhopadhyay.

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Indrajit (Ritwick Chakraborty) is searching for his lost childhood. He visits the beautiful range of Himalayas in search of his lost innocence and stays with his old friend Moloy (Bratya Basu) and his wife Tuki (Swastika Mukherjee). With time, Indrajit discovers the disintegrated relationship between Moloy and Tuki and also Tuki’s addiction towards other males for physical and mental needs. Indrajit has a past and quite accidentally,...

There are many theories behind the suicidal nature of human beings and among those one of the most popular and well accepted is of American psychiatrist Karl Menninger’s theory, where he has explained three mental stages: the wish to be killed (guilt), the wish to kill (revenge), and the wish to die (hopelessness). Srijit Mukherji deals with the “wish to die” or the hopelessness syndrome in “Hemlock Society,” in an analytical style and ends up with a masterpiece, which portrays the emotional quotients of human and questions the impact of modern – urban lifestyle on our mind aligning with the Surrealist theory of Andre Breton (Black comedy).

Meghna (Koel Mallick) is tired with life. She has been ditched by her fourteen year long relationship with her fiancée. She doesn’t enjoy the company of her step-mother and misses her deceased mother and her childhood days. The days...

Kanchan Mullick, the quintessential comedian of Bengali cinema, is back on stage and how! After making his mark as an actor, Kanchan has finally made his directorial debut with Bratya Basu’s Ekdin Aladin with Paikpara Indraranga. “I just realised that directing is not an easy job. You will become like a konyadayegrostho pita. From lights and sets to the acting department — you have to take care of everything,” Kanchan told us. Ekdin Aladin is a slapstick comedy — a new flavour for Indraranga. The play was staged earlier under the direction of Premangshu Roy. But playwright Bratya Basu took away the rights from him after Premangshu was marred by controversy.

A pre-midlife crisis occasioned by a creeping sense of bewilderment and remorse besets a single young professional from Kolkata in Suman Mukhopadhyay's Incomplete. Examining familiar relationship issues without much originality or conviction, this overly long feature will struggle to break out beyond the international festival circuit, except perhaps on scattered digital platforms.

Chronically indecisive, mid-30s Indrajit (Ritwick Chakraborty) has managed to drift into adulthood with few commitments. On holiday in the Himalayan foothills to visit Moloy (Bratya Basu), he finds his university friend ensconced in a small cottage among his overflowing shelves of books, wrapped in blankets to ward of the...

Irrfan Khan is set to co-produce and star in Bangladeshi filmmaker Mostofa S. Farooki’s No Bed Of Roses, which is scheduled to start shooting later this month.

Khan’s Ik Company will co-produce the film, described as “a family story about loss and love”, with Bangladesh’s Jazz Multimedia and India’s Essay Movies. Jazz Multimedia will distribute in Bangladesh.

The cast also includes Nusrat Imrose Tisha, who appeared in Farooki’s 2012 drama Television; Rokeya Prachy, whose credits include The Clay Bird, which won the Fipresci prize in Cannes Directors Fortnight in 2002; Parno Mittra and Bratya Basu.

The Bengali and English-language project was selected for the 2013 edition of Film Bazaar, organised by India’s National Film Development Corp (Nfdc), where it won the Dubai Film Market award.

Television, about an imam in a Bangladeshi village who bans TV, closed Busan International Film Festival in 2012 and won the Grand Jury Prize at the 2013 Asia Pacific Screen Awards...