Teen Kanya (1961)

Director:

Satyajit Ray

Writers:

Satyajit Ray (writer)
Rabindranath Tagore (stories)

Release Date:

5 May 1961 (India)

Genre:

Comedy | Drama

Plot:

The first story is about Nanda, a young man who leaves Calcutta to work as a postmaster in an isolated malaria-infested village...

Cast

  (Cast overview, first billed only)

Chandana Banerjee	...	Ratan (segment "Postmaster")
Nripati Chatterjee	...	Bishey (segment "Postmaster")
Anil Chatterjee	...	Nandal (segment "Postmaster")
Khagen Pathak	...	Khagen (segment "Postmaster")
Gopal Roy	...	Bilash (segment "Postmaster")
Kali Bannerjee	...	Phanibhushan Saha (segment "Monihara")
Kanika Majumdar	...	Manimalika (segment "Monihara")
Kumar Roy	...	Madhusudan (segment "Monihara")
Govinda Chakravarti	...	Schoolmaster and narrator (segment "Monihara")
Soumitra Chatterjee	...	Amulya (segment "Samapti")
Aparna Sen	...	Mrinmoyee (segment "Samapti") (as Aparna Das Gupta)
Sita Mukherjee	...	Jogmaya (segment "Samapti")
Gita Dey	...	Nistarini (segment "Samapti")
Santosh Dutta	...	Kishori (segment "Samapti")
Mihir Chakravarti	...	Rakhal (segment "Samapti")

Also Known As:

Three Daughters
Two Daughters

Runtime:

173 min

Country:

India

Language:

Bengali

Color:

Black and White

Sound Mix:

Mono

Company:

Satyajit Ray Productions

Trivia:

Collection of three short films: "Postmaster", "Monihara" and "Samapti". "Monihara" was dropped for the "Two Daughters" version.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in The Darjeeling Limited (2007)

How to make a movie from a simple story !

I have been a fan of Ray for a long time and I have seen most of his famous films. This film was not available for some time because the quality of the film was deteriorating so badly that they had to restore the entire film. Originally made with three entirely unrelated short stories by Nobel Prize winner Rabindranath Tagore, the restored version has only two stories of the original three. In both the stories Postmaster and Samapti you will find the inimitable Ray touch. You can see the same neo realistic portrayal of simple lives and events of ordinary people. Postmaster evokes a feeling of pity for the young girl, but at the same time it seems to reflect the strength and courage of ordinary people going about their lives. The second story "samapti", though not as tight as the first (it winds around a bit before it reaches a climactic finish) again pours life into a simple story about a young girl who is reluctant to let go of her childhood and who is pushed into the world of adulthood. Aparna Sen ( Ray finds such beautiful women to play in his movies) plays this part brilliantly. The picturisque Bengal country side comes to life in this colourful black and white film. A must see for anyone who likes films.