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Outbyte PC Repair FREERepair Windows errors before they cause bigger problemsFix Now →Outbyte Driver Updater FREEFix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitchesFind Drivers →Dhritiman Chatterjee remembers Pratidwandi as a film shaped by Satyajit Ray’s close observation of people, a script-led working method and a restless portrait of a young man searching for work and direction. In a 2021 centenary-year interview, Chatterjee said the film still felt contemporary because young viewers recognize its confusion and uncertainty in their own lives.
What Pratidwandi is about
Directed and written by Satyajit Ray and adapted from a novel by Sunil Gangopadhyay, Pratidwandi—also known as The Adversary—follows Siddhartha, a young man who leaves his studies after his father’s unexpected death and looks for work. The job hunt exposes him to social pressures and political divisions, while deepening his sense of isolation and disillusionment. The International Film Festival of Kerala’s synopsis emphasizes his introspection and helplessness; Sahapedia places his struggle amid the upheaval of the city.
The film’s date is not consistent across the available references. The International Film Festival of Kerala archive and Sahapedia list it as a 1970 film, while Scroll’s 2021 interview describes it as a 1971 film. Those sources do not establish whether the discrepancy reflects different production or release milestones, so neither year should be treated as uncontested. Sahapedia identifies it as the first film in Ray’s Calcutta Trilogy, followed by Seemabaddha (1971).
How Dhritiman Chatterjee came to play Siddhartha
Chatterjee was studying for a postgraduate degree at the Delhi School of Economics in the mid-1960s when he and friends formed a film society called Celluloid. The group sought conversations with filmmakers, including Ray and Mrinal Sen. Later, through a friend connected to Ray’s extended family, Chatterjee visited Ray while he was preparing a new film. Chatterjee recalls that they spoke at length before Ray cast him.
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At the time, Chatterjee worked for a metal-container company and had not set out to become a full-time actor. He says part of his interest in cinema was the chance to see how Ray and Sen worked; he later moved into advertising. Pratidwandi was his first experience in front of a camera, and Scroll describes the role as his screen debut.
Chatterjee says Ray watched newcomers carefully and drew on details such as their body language when shaping characters. He remembers Ray as “a very keen observer.” For the role, Chatterjee had not read Gangopadhyay’s novel; he says that when acting in adaptations, he preferred to focus on the screenplay and the director’s vision. That was his own working practice, not a sign that the novel or its story was unavailable to him.
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Ray’s script-centered way of working
In Chatterjee’s recollection, Ray completed the script, then brought actors and crew together to read it. Ray would effectively act out the script as he delivered the dialogue, and the group discussed it at that meeting. Chatterjee says Ray did not rely on workshops or extended over-analysis.
The approach left room for a performer’s own voice. In the job-interview scene, Ray wanted Chatterjee to speak English naturally rather than imitate a Bengali accent. Chatterjee later wondered whether he had played the scene too glibly or smartly; he recalls that Ray did not share that concern.
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A young man’s job hunt in a divided city
Sahapedia describes the film’s Calcutta through crowded buses, congested roads, coffee shops and other everyday spaces. It situates Siddhartha’s search for a career and a future against youth unemployment, deindustrialisation, post-Partition migration and political division. These are qualitative descriptions of the film’s setting and context, not numerical measures of unemployment, migration or industrial decline.
Chatterjee’s own memories add the texture of daily disruption. He recalls strikes, crowds, distant disturbances and interrupted public transport around College Street and the coffee house. Those recollections convey what the period felt like to him, rather than serving as a comprehensive history of the city’s political unrest.
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New cinematic rhythms and real Kolkata locations
Chatterjee connects the film’s newer idiom to techniques he had encountered in French New Wave-influenced cinema shown in Calcutta, including jump cuts, freeze frames and direct address. He recalls that Mrinal Sen adopted such devices readily, while he was less sure whether Ray wanted to seem more contemporary. Chatterjee also remembers unspoken criticism that Ray was not addressing contemporary problems. He describes Ray as practical about budgets, speed and obligations to producers. These are Chatterjee’s reflections on the creative context, not a definitive account of Ray’s intentions.
One sequence was filmed with an actual bus rather than a vehicle hired for the shoot, Chatterjee says. He rode on its footboard while Ray followed with a handheld camera on Lindsay Street. Chatterjee recalls that the sequence was completed in two hours or less. The combination of real city movement and a compressed filming process fits the film’s alert, unsettled view of urban life.
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The interview scene: a job question becomes a test of values
In Scroll’s account of the pivotal interview, Siddhartha identifies the Vietnam War—not the moon landing—as the most significant event of the preceding decade, unsettling the executives interviewing him. The scene turns an ordinary attempt to secure employment into a clash over what deserves attention and how a candidate is expected to answer. This is a paraphrase of Scroll’s description, not a verified transcript of the scene’s dialogue.
Why Chatterjee says the film still feels contemporary
Asked how Pratidwandi has held up, Chatterjee answered, “I think it’s very contemporary.” In the 2021 interview, he said young people at film seminars told him they saw their own confusion and lack of direction in the film. For him, a classic is one that does not become tiring to watch and continues to offer surprises.
That response helps explain the film’s durability without suggesting that the pressures facing young people have stayed identical across decades. Siddhartha’s particular circumstances belong to a specific city and period; Chatterjee’s point is that uncertainty about work, purpose and the future remains legible to new viewers.
Quick Recap
Sources
- Nandini Ramnath’s interview with Dhritiman Chatterjee, Scroll.in, March 21, 2021
- International Film Festival of Kerala archive entry for Pratidwandi
- Sahapedia overview of Pratidwandi
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