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Director: Rituparno

Producer: Rituparno

Music: Debojyoti Misra

Cast: Aishwarya Rai, Raima Sen, Lily Chakrabarti, Prosenjit, Tota Roy Choudhury...

Chokher Bali, a Rs 2.5-crore film based on a Tagore novel, is perhaps Rituparno's most ambitious project till date. So ambitious, in fact, that he roped in none other than Aisharwya Rai to play Binodini, the female protagonist in the film. Debojyoti Misra has lived up to his reputation as one of the finest music directors in the film industry at present.
Chokher Bali provides a glimpse into Bengali society and takes up issues like widow remarriage and sati. The film has already been screened at the Locarno Film Festival and has Aishwarya Rai as its biggest draw.

Synopsis: The Tagore novel revolves around four characters. The male protagonists, Mahendra (Prosenjit) and Behari (Tota Roy Choudhury), are both studying for a medical degree in Calcutta at a time when the shadow of partition ("Bangabhanga") looms large over Bengal. Although mostly shot indoors, the film is also a feast for the eyes. Aveek Mukherjee's cinematography is beautiful.

The women in the film include Binodini (Aishwarya Rai) a beautiful, intelligent widow who is not afraid of rebelling and Ashalata (Raima Sen), a young, naïve girl with no intellectual credentials to boast off. Binodini is proposed as a match for Mahendra, but he rejects her. Behari gets engaged to Ashalata, but Mahendra ends up marrying her. Binodini, who has in the meantime got married and widowed, arrives at the latter's house to become a companion to Mahendra's mother, Rajlakshmi (Lily Chakrabarti). She meets Mahendra, Behari and Ashalata there. Binodini strikes up a rapport with Ashalata and begins to realise the lifestyle she has lost thanks to Mahendra's rejection. Her refusal to accept a widow's existence and everything that goes with it forms the pivot of the story. Finally, Mahendra gives in to Binodini, and a shell-shocked Ashalata leaves for Benares. Rai is fantastic in the film. She has done everything required of her, switching over effortlessly from meek submission to outright rebellion. And in doing so, she has busted the myth that beauty and brains don't go together. Tota Roy Choudhury and Lily Chakrabarti don't disappoint either.