It was as a seven-year-old that film maker Goutam Ghose got a preview into what director Satyajit Ray was all about. And it moved him to tears. The young Ghose wept inside the movie hall as Durga, that caring elder sister of young Apu of Ray´s trilogy, passed away in Pather Panchali.
Several years later, as Ghose himself became a director of international repute, Father Panchali continued to be his benchmark film, and its creator, his muse. So when the Satyajit Ray Archive (in 1996) approached Ghose with the proposal to make a comprehensive biographical documentary on the maestro, he took it up as an honour, but only knowing too well the challenge it posed. Ghose was handpicked by Ray´s widow, Bijoya Ray, after her son, Sandip Ray, declined to direct Ray. Bijoya Ray wouldn´t perhaps regret that choice, as the 100-minute documentary got rave reviews when shown as a special event at the Venice Film Festival in September 1999.
"I had my doubts when I was asked to do the film, and was at a loss as how to start," recalls Ghose. "In the 60s people like James Beverage and B.D. Garg, and in the 80s Shyam Benegal had made documentaries on Ray, but no one had done anything after his death. So I was frantically looking for a spine to start the work, and be different from others. I knew that mere presentation of Ray the filmmaker would not be sufficient to capture the life and works of a person who was not just a filmmaker but a great mind as well."
Ghose found the "spine" during the six months of research at Ray´s house. It came in the form of the director´s famous red notebook called Kheror Khatha (´Accounts´ Book) which gave a fascinating peep into the man´s multi-facete. talents. "The book contains things like the script of a film, the initial sketch of a logo, a short story, things like that. It represents his interesting doubts and sense of wonders and I think it is the best emotional link that I could find to make this documentary," says Ghose.