Days and Nights in the Forest

Adapted from Sunil Gangopadhyay’s celebrated 1968 novel, Days and Nights in the Forest is one of director Satyajit Ray’s greatest achievements, a modern search for connection that conjures the timeless resonance of a folktale. Desperate to flee Calcutta’s rat race, four friends—Ashim (Soumitra Chatterjee), Sanjoy (Subhendu Chatterjee), Hari (Samit Bhanja), and Shekhar (Rabi Ghosh)—drive to Palamu, one of India’s rural “tribal lands,” where they bribe a watchman into letting them stay at a sylvan guesthouse. Despite vowing to get away from it all, the crew soon mixes with the locals, including a woodland family: the soulful yet mischievous Aparna (Sharmila Tagore) takes to the overconfident Ashim, while her widowed sister-in-law Jaya (Kaberi Bose) grows closer to the bookish Sanjoy. At the same time, Hari, fresh off a break-up, woos a Santal girl named Duli (Simi Garewal); and Shekhar, despite his own penchant for gambling, tries to rein in his companions’ boozy hedonism. Filled with some of Ray’s most indelible characterizations and lavish images (shot by longtime cinematographer Soumendu Roy), Days and Nights in the Forest touches on masculine vulnerabilities and Indian class divisions with the graceful complexity of a master at his peak.

Restored in 4K in 2025 by The Film Foundation’s World Cinema Project and Film Heritage Foundation in collaboration with Janus Films – The Criterion Collection at L’Immagine Ritrovata laboratory, from the original camera and sound negatives provided by Purnima Dutta and the magnetic track preserved by BFI National Archive. Funding provided by the Golden Globe Foundation. Special thanks to Wes Anderson and Sandip Ray.