Banchharamer Bagaan (Bengali pronunciation:; transl. Banchharam's garden) is a 1980 Bengali-language satirical comedy-horror film co-written and directed by Tapan Sinha. Produced by Dhiresh Kumar Chakraborty under the banner of D. K. Film Enterprises, the film is based on Manoj Mitra's celebrated stage-play Shajano Bagaan. It stars Mitra himself as Banchharam, an elderly frail peasant who outwits a tyrannical landlord attempting to seize his beloved garden by deceptively staying alive and healthy, despite having signed over his land in exchange for a monthly pension upon his promised death. Dipankar De plays dual roles as the landlord and his son, alongside Madhabi Mukherjee, Nirmal Kumar, Biplab Chatterjee, Bhishma Guhathakurata and Debika Mukherjee in the supporting roles, with Bhanu Banerjee and Rabi Ghosh in special appearances.
After Sinha watched the play in 1978, he immediately decided to adapt it into a film, with Mitra reprising the role from the play. Banchharamer Bagaan marks the first collaboration between Sinha and Mitra, and also the debut of the latter. Music of the film is composed by Sinha himself, while Bimal Mukherjee and Subodh Roy handled its cinematography and editing respectively.
Banchharamer Bagaan was theatrically released on 17 October 1980, opening to highly positive response. It ran for over 210 days in theatres, emerging to be one of the highest-grossing Bengali films of the year. It attained a cult status over the years and is regarded as "one of the best comedy films" by The Times of India. At the 18th Filmfare Awards East, the film received several accolades, including Best Film, Best Director (Sinha) and Best Actor (Mitra).
Banchharamer Bagaan was remade into Hindi as Isi Ka Naam Zindagi (1992) and into Marathi as Narbachi Wadi (2013).
Source: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
No comments yet — be the first.
Sign in — Sign in to leave a comment or review.