The Inner Eye

The Inner Eye
The Inner Eye (short film 1972, title card)
Title card of the film
Directed bySatyajit Ray
Written bySatyajit Ray
Screenplay bySatyajit Ray
Based onLife and works of Benode Behari Mukherjee
Produced byFilms Division of India
StarringBenode Behari Mukherjee
Narrated bySatyajit Ray
CinematographySoumendu Roy
Edited byDulal Dutta
Music bySatyajit Ray
Distributed byFilms Division of India
Release date
  • 1972 (1972)
Running time
20 minutes
CountryIndia
LanguageEnglish

The Inner Eye is a 1972 short documentary film made by Satyajit Ray on Benode Behari Mukherjee, a blind artist and a teacher from Visva-Bharati University, a university founded by Rabindranath Tagore at Santiniketan.[1] The twenty minutes documentary features the life and works of Mukherjee in the form of paintings and photographs, starring himself. The documentary covers his journey from childhood till his blindness along with much of his works and features his words, "Blindness is a new feeling, a new experience, a new state of being".[2][3][4] The documentary was awarded as Best Information Film (Documentary) at 20th National Film Awards in 1972.[5]

Mukherjee is known as the most informed Indian artist of his generation and a legend of modern Asian Art.[6] Born with severe eye problem, being myopic on one eye and blind in the other, Mukherjee lost his sight completely after an unsuccessful cataract operation. However, he continued his work as an artist.

The Academy Film Archive, part of the Academy Foundation, took an initiative to restore Satyajit Ray's films and could successfully restore 19 Ray films. The Inner Eye is yet to be restored but found to be in good condition for the restoration.[7] The film's original script was included in a book named Original English Film Scripts Satyajit Ray, put together by Ray's son Sandip Ray.[8]

  1. ^ "Inner [email protected]". Archived from the original on 22 February 2013. Retrieved 3 January 2013.
  2. ^ "The Inner [email protected]". Archived from the original on 3 July 2016. Retrieved 3 January 2013.
  3. ^ Mukherjee, Madhuja. "Early Indian Talkies: Voice, Performance and Aura". Retrieved 3 January 2013.
  4. ^ Robinson, Andrew (January 1989). "Chapter 26: Documentaries: Sikkim (1971) Sukumar Ray (1987) Bala (1976) Rabindranath Tagore (1961) The Inner Eye (1972)". Satyajit Ray: The Inner Eye. I. B. Tauris; Revised and Updated edition. p. 282. ISBN 1860649653.
  5. ^ Cite error: The named reference 20thaward was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  6. ^ "Binod Bihari [email protected]". 8 March 2011. Archived from the original on 26 April 2012. Retrieved 3 January 2013.
  7. ^ Cite error: The named reference restore was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  8. ^ Cite error: The named reference rayscript was invoked but never defined (see the help page).