M ore than six decades have passed since Satyajit Ray released Devi in 1960. If it came out today, the film probably wouldn’t last in theatres for more than a few days, triggering the blind faith and superstition that continues to shape the collective conscience. Ray’s message is still as piercing.

Devi is arguably one of the rawest portrayals of how devotion destroys what it seeks to protect. How it can curdle into obsession. How religion, when unchecked, can consume reason.

The film is set up in rural Bengal in a zamindar’s household headed by the deeply religious Kalikinkar Choudhuri (Chhabi Biswas). His devotion to Goddess Kali dominates every corner of his life and home. His son, Umaprasad (Soumitra Chatterjee), though, is a modern thinker. He studies in Calcutta and is in

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