Goresthane Sabdhan

Sandip has relocated the Feluda novel published in 1977 by flashing it forward to 2010 and making slightly necessary changes to the script to fit into the present time-frame.

Sandip Ray strikes a different note this time in his series on Feluda,the detective created by his father Satyajit Ray in an action adventure series for children. Gorosthane Sabdhan is rooted in Kolkata where Feluda explores forgotten places in the city to solve the mystery of the digging up of the forgotten grave of one Thomas Godwin at the Park Street Cemetery (that has 2000 graves) but has not been used for many years. Feluda ventures into a mystery without being commissioned. One skeleton after another in the dead Godwins cupboard begins to topple,taking the audience into nooks and corners of a Calcutta that existed long back and keeps haunting the present Kolkata. Sandip has relocated the novel published in 1977 by flashing it forward to 2010 and making slightly necessary changes to the script to fit into the present time-frame.

Each discovery leads to another one,unfolding strange characters trapped in a world of their own such as Godwins gout-infected brother Marquis Godwin (Tinnu Anand),another brother Araquis Godwin (Tamal Roychoudhury) who is addicted to bringing spirits back from the dead,Naren Biswas (Pradip Mukherjee) who was attacked by someone in the cemetery that night,his many-faced younger brother William Girin Biswas (Subhashish Mukherjee),and last but never the least,the intriguing,flamboyant clock and watch collector Mahadeb Choudhury (Dhritiman Chatterjee).

The camera,the soundtrack and the music follow the adventurous and intelligent Feluda (Sabyasachi Chakraborty),his young Watson-Topshe (Saheb Bhattacharya) and his admirer the popular detective fiction writer Jatayu (Bibhu Bhattacharya) as they wind their way through Bourne and Shepherd,the oldest photographic studio in Kolkata that still exists,Ripon Street,the road where the dilapidated building with its equally dilapidated tenants Marquis and Araquis live,a small STD booth standing beneath,the tomb of Job Charnock juxtaposed against modern additions like the Seagull Bookstore in the southern parts of Kolkata,Trincas,the old restaurant on Park Street that is still around and the red-carpeted staircase that leads to Mahadeb Choudhurys lavishly-decorated home where all his 250 clocks chime together at the dot of six.

The cinematography,especially in the Park Street Cemetery,is brilliant. The film opens on the credit titles flashed on the gravestones on a night of heavy rains and the camera moves in circles,in an imaginative experiment. It catches the intrigue and eerie ambience of a graveyard at night,embellished with ambient sound effects.

The theme music is derived from the stock the older Ray left behind. Sabyasachi has grown older from the time he first donned the role. He now looks too old to be a cousin to the teenager-looking Topshe portrayed by Saheb. Sabyasachi is very good,investing his performance with the subtle arrogance it demands without slighting his two followers Topshe and Jatayu. A touching scene where Jatayu gives away his heirloom pocket watch to Feluda shows the latter visibly moved.

The cameo characters offer solid support. Tinnu Anand is wonderful as the Godwin heir who has gambled away everything except an ivory box that contains the red-covered diaries of Godwins dead daughter. Tamal Roychoudhury does very well in a single scene. Pradip Mukherjee desperately trying to hide his family skeletons including the identity of the man who attacked him is suitably low-key. Subhasish Mukherjee is very good as his younger brother. Dhritiman Chatterjee as Mahadeb Choudhury is his usual theatrical and flamboyant self. This time,the theatricality suits the character. The film closes on a lyrical note with the camera capturing Feluda and Topshe from behind in semi-silhouette seated on a bench along the banks near Raichak.

Gorosthane Sabdhan is not as much a suspense thriller as it is a rollercoaster ride along the streets and lanes of Kolkata,peeping now and then into a graveyard,into the New Alipur home of the Biswas brothers,into a bookstore or stopping outside an I-café. But it is the best Feluda film Sandip Ray has made. I grant the film four stars – for the tight script,the wonderful acting,the brilliant cinematography and the skillful direction.