The sixth film of Bengali film director Anjan Das is a slowly moving arthouse film which features good actors and beautiful music. It is a literary adaption from the novel The Flautist by Shirshendu Mukhopadhyay and that instrument obviously has been one of the inspirations for the very lyrical, melodical songs here. Anjan Das already died in 2014 after directing eight feature films - for Banshiwala he was awarded two prices at international film festivals.
The film basically asks the moral question if a house as a building is merely a property (of investment) or if it's somehow a sacred place of remembrance. In this case, the house even is a little bit run-down but still an impressive ancestral manor which bears memories of multiple generations of the family. So, selling it would be the equal to giving away the familial heritage. But there's a dark and hidden secret, too, which has to be challenged as the story comes to a close. In some abstract scenes, the film reminded me of Mani Kaul's aesthetics of filmmaking, though this one here is much more plot driven. I'm very happy to having it seen.
Michael Schleeh
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