Nayak

Bengali matinee idol Arindam Mukherjee is travelling by train from (then) Calcutta to Delhi to collect a film award. Among his fellow travelers is the young editor of a modern woman’s magazine. She begins interviewing the actor and Mukherjee reveals the dark side of his career and his fears for his future – most recently, he made headlines after an altercation at a nightclub, and his last film looks set to be a flop … This artful and critical film is something of a biopic, as it is loosely based on the life of lead actor Uttam Kumar. In flashbacks and surrealistic dream sequences, we see behind the public face of the crude, unapproachable star and find an insecure man who has subjugated himself to the will of the film industry for the sake of success. Nayak was shown at the 1966 Berlin International Film Festival and Satyajit Ray was awarded ‘Special Recognition’ for the film and his life achievement. For the restoration, the original negative was scanned in 2K resolution and then processed frame by frame. – International premiere of the digitally restored version.