About

The Lonely Wife will screen from an archival 35mm film print.

Cloistered in a sumptuous mansion in 19th century India, Charulata (Madhabi Mukherjee) is the wife of the loving but preoccupied journalist and intellectual Bhupati. Concerned with his wife's wellbeing, Bhupati invites his cousin Amal, a poet, to keep Charulata company.

Based on the novel The Broken Nest, by the Bengal poet and mystic Rabindranath Tagore, the meeting of Amal and Charulata begins her unexpected intellectual and sexual awakening. One of Satyajit Ray's most revered films, Subrata Mitra's exquisitecinematography frames Charulata's transformation through enclosing ornate doorways and interiors to a revelatory scene in a sun-dappled garden in which she sits on a swing while Amal recites poetry.