Some filmmakers are so historically resonant, that the very mention of their name seems to be an assurance of the quality of what we are about to see. When it comes to Satyajit Ray, few filmmakers have been more worthy of being cited as the most important to ever come from their country as him, with his decades of incredible work being indicative of true talent, so much that even his slightly more minor works are still unquestionably worth watching. This is the case with The Holy Man (Hindi: ), in which he aims at the subject of religion, focusing on the story of a supposed holy man who integrates himself into the high society of Calcutta, fooling the rich and wealthy into surrendering to his charms, and taking advantage of their gullible nature and willingness to take anything they see at face value, granted it is convincing. Very few would ever consider this to be Ray’s greatest film, especially not when he is the director behind several of the greatest films to ever be produced on the Indian sub-continent – but what many will see as an unimpeachable truth is the brilliance that lingers beneath the surface of this seemingly minor work, which is a lot more compelling than it may initially seem to be on the surface. It is becoming increasingly rare to find filmmakers who are so thoroughly committed to their craft that the very act of seeing them produce any work is a revelation, and Ray has always been considered the gold standard for global cinema, someone whose work is both embraced within his home country and adored internationally, accessible but challenging and always captivating and The Holy Man is proof that even when playing in an inarguably minor key, there is a lot of merit in what he is doing on screen, even if it isn’t always at the peak of his abilities.

When it comes to the subject of humour, there is very little doubt that it doesn’t always translate well across the language barrier, unless we are dealing with a kind of comedy that is more aligned with slapstick. Watching a comedy in a foreign language in which much of the humour is derived from clever wordplay is often quite difficult since there are intricacies in language that can sometimes be a challenge for audiences to appreciate if they aren’t proficient. Similarly, we can find these challenges in films that draw their humour from cultural quirks, since it does require the audience to have at least incidental familiarity with the social details to at least partially understand the appeal of these stories. From the start, The Holy Man was at a slight disadvantage, since most of Ray’s other work was far more dramatic, and usually touched on universal issues that didn’t require any prior knowledge of Indian culture or society to appreciate. This film is quite different – it is a work of comedy, and considering very few of the director’s humorous works have been appreciated as much as his dramatic fare, it is understandable that there would be some challenges in fully embracing the style embedded at the heart of the film. However, this doesn’t disqualify The Holy Man from being any less impressive as a feat of comedy, since there are still several aspects that are profoundly captivating and frequently quite compelling in ways that we may not expect. While it is true understanding not only the details of the language used throughout the film, as well as the socio-cultural nuances are important, they are not too much of an impediment to the storyline, since the narrative is not fully dependent on these qualities, but rather on slightly more universal themes. While we may miss out on an occasional pun or satirical reference, Ray’s work is still very funny and can certainly be appreciated as far more than just a bundle of impenetrable references. As a result, our experience with The Holy Man may not be as insightful and revelatory as some of his more poetic work, but it is still wildly entertaining, and its nuances are still quite clear, even to those of us with only limited knowledge of the social milieux that the director was satirizing throughout this film.

Most notably, the aspects of The Holy Man that stand out the most to us are those qualities that relate less to the specific storyline and more to the broader implications of the narrative. Ray may have been making a comedy, but that didn’t prevent him from inserting many fascinating elements into the heart of the narrative, specifically about the class system, which is something that punctuates nearly all of his work. Regardless of which film of his you choose to watch, there is likely going to be some commentary on how India functioned, either historically or from his contemporary perspective, and while very few of them were hard-hitting, overly dense cultural critiques, they all contained some degree of complexity in how they viewed the world in which they took place, which was very often a case of trying to understand precisely what it was that made society take on such a vivid appearance. Except for his active attempts to explore Indian history, Ray’s primary motivation for making films like The Holy Man (and other films set in the present day) was to offer a snapshot of different mentalities, attitudes and behaviours, focusing on the interactions between characters as they go about their daily lives. In terms of this film, he is aiming at religion, which is one of the fundamental concepts on which Indian society was built, remaining a very important aspect in the lives of the population. His issue is not with religion as a whole (as Ray’s work was always respectful of spirituality and belief, as both a cultural construct and psychological aid), but rather those few individuals who decided to profit off of faith, which is already a theme that many of us can relate to, even if the specific details are slightly more obscure. These elements all work together to create a vibrant and fascinating satire, and Ray truly does prove his mettle as a terrific filmmaker, and someone whose touches of humour may seem abstract at first, but work perfectly in the context of this film.

Despite often being cited as being an intermediary film made in between major productions like The Big City and The Hero (usually alongside the equally short and similarly quaint The Coward, with which it was often paired as a double feature), this film still proves Ray’s incredible prowess behind the camera. Regardless of how compact it may seem, there is still an abundance of directorial complexity that defines this film. Ray certainly knew how to make bold proclamations and deliver on every single promise, and this film was not at all an exception since there were so many compelling ideas that the director was very keen to work with, even if some of them were not nearly as fleshed out at they could have been. A lot of the credit must be given to the actors, with the ensemble cast being quite remarkable – Charuprakash Ghosh is delightfully perverse as the hedonistic title character, a man who has been driven to the point of insanity by his greed, while Rabi Ghosh is fantastic as his partner, who switches between dimwitted and wildly intelligent depending on the company. Even the actors cast to play the holy man’s victims are incredible, with the performances by Satindra Bhattacharya and Prasad Mukherjee in particular being very funny, but also not nearly as one-dimensional as one may expect. There is something quite profound about how this film operates, and the combination of humour and striking images is quite difficult to forget, especially when they work together in nearly perfect synchronicity, making The Holy Man a far better film than we may initially expect based on a cursory glance. Ray’s directorial prowess isn’t always about portraying the most complex aspects of his stories, but also creating vibrant and entertaining depictions of everyday life, and this film contains some of his most memorable work.

Running at only an hour, there isn’t much space for The Holy Man to deliver on absolutely every aspect of its premise, but what it does deliver is a solid, very funny account of the lives of these characters as they go about interacting in several ways. It isn’t always the most neatly-defined film and some of its ideas are too abstract to be all that effective, but there is certainly enough charm to overlook these issues. The further we explore into Ray’s career, the more we find these gems, which may never be considered major works in the traditional sense but still have enough complexity to keep us interested and engaged, even at their most unorthodox. It may pale in comparison to his towering masterpieces, and at its core, this is a very simple, unquestionably straightforward film without much complexity – but as an example of his versatility in tone, and reliability in touching on certain themes that give us fascinating insights into India in the past, The Holy Man is a triumph, just not on the ways we may necessarily expect. It’s a simple film with an unfurnished premise, but it executes all of its ideas perfectly and without any difficulty, proving itself to be quite an extraordinary work of socially charged satire, and one of the several fantastic films that populate this exceptional career that has deservedly come to be viewed as one of the most important in the history of cinema.