The Ritual (Ghatashraddha)
Second Run / Blu Ray
The Ritual was the 1977 debut feature of Indian director Girish Kasaravalli. For many years it was very difficult to see in the West. Now thanks to the Film Heritage Foundation it’s been beautifully restored. In the late 1960’s an independent film movement arose in the South Indian state of Karnataka. It was called Indian Parallel Cinema. Greatly inspired by Italian neo-realism their subject matter drew heavily on social concerns about class, poverty and inequality. A ground breaking influence on Kasaravalli was Satyajit Ray’s Pather Panchali (1959). Certainly The Ritual shares Ray’s social observation of rural life and its traditions. Yet technically and emotionally it’s starker: an uncompromising view of village life in the 1920’s. The Ritual has much sparsely beautiful imagery, a stalking camera observing its characters with a degree of detachment that’s different to the warm aesthetics of Ray.
The teacher Udupa operates a run-down Vedic school from his house in a village. His Brahim students are rough and undisciplined. Udupa lives with his daughter Yamuna. She’s widowed and has secretly met a school teacher from a neighbouring village and is now pregnant by him. Nanni a young boy arrives at the village to be a new student at the school. A friendship develops between Nanni and Yamuna. Udapa is desperate for money. He goes off to raise funds for the school. The students are unruly and bully Nanni. Then the village learn of Yamuna’s pregnancy and want her to be excommunicated from the village. Yamuna’s lover arranges an abortion for her. When Udupa returns and learns what’s happened he performs a ritual to make his daughter an outcast. Throughout such dreadful persecution Nanni is the only person to support Yamuna.
Early on there’s a strong feeling of predictability about The Ritual that all will bode ill for Yamuna (stoically well acted by Meena Kuttappa). However Kasaravelli’s direction avoids any over-emphasis neither on her suffering nor for the absence of empathy shown by the villagers. It’s a distanced, non-judgemental approach that in its matter of fact manner reveals a pitiless view of cruel behaviour supported by a repressive moral code. And the director’s detachment avoids any irony and cynicism. It simply says this is reality. It’s up to you whether things change or not. I’m showing how things are. I’m not telling you to do something about an unjust community when the rules of religion are broken.
This might have appeared cold hearted if Kasaravelli hadn’t shown the intense bonding of child (Nanni is eloquently acted by Ajit Kumar) and adult. Also this doesn’t become an obvious mother / son type relationship but more the temporary journey and flight of two kindred and misunderstood spirits.
Shadows are used highly effectively in The Ritual. They work metaphorically to suggest being pursued by dark and irrational forces and also how the woman and boy could be reduced to a shadow of their former self because of their disobedience. Interestingly Yamuna doesn’t protest but the innocent Nanni does all the protesting. The young will grow up to be psychologically marred and may or may not change the social order.
Outstanding lighting and some powerful night photography accompany a tracking camera that halts only when it needs to and then moves on with an inevitable and succinct rhythm. I particularly admired the scene when an untouchable beggar named Dalif, played by an uncredited local extra, yielding a flaming torch to light the way, accompanies Nanni through the woods to search for the body of the abandoned Yamuna. At one point Nanni goes to touch the beggar but the caste system causes him to recoil at the boy’s attempt to kindly reach out. This politically charged moment can be placed alongside the angry banging on the doors and wooden caged windows of Yamuna’s house by the locals; the abortion attempt sequence; the indifference of her lover who pays to get rid of the baby then calmly cycles back home to his village and the dark process of Yamuna’s final ritualistic banishment.
The Ritual deservedly won awards for its direction, acting, screenplay, photography and music. And Girish Kasaravalli went on to make 15 feature films and a couple of documentaries that won him even more awards. He presented the restored The Ritual at this year’s Venice film festival; 47 years on after its release we have a raw, intense and outstanding example of the Indian New Wave. I’m left impatient to explore Kasaravalli’s other films.
Alan Price©2026
The Ritual (Ghatashraddha)
Second Run / Blu Ray
The Ritual was the 1977 debut feature of Indian director Girish Kasaravalli. For many years it was very difficult to see in the West. Now thanks to the Film Heritage Foundation it’s been beautifully restored. In the late 1960’s an independent film movement arose in the South Indian state of Karnataka. It was called Indian Parallel Cinema. Greatly inspired by Italian neo-realism their subject matter drew heavily on social concerns about class, poverty and inequality. A ground breaking influence on Kasaravalli was Satyajit Ray’s Pather Panchali (1959). Certainly The Ritual shares Ray’s social observation of rural life and its traditions. Yet technically and emotionally it’s starker: an uncompromising view of village life in the 1920’s. The Ritual has much sparsely beautiful imagery, a stalking camera observing its characters with a degree of detachment that’s different to the warm aesthetics of Ray.
The teacher Udupa operates a run-down Vedic school from his house in a village. His Brahim students are rough and undisciplined. Udupa lives with his daughter Yamuna. She’s widowed and has secretly met a school teacher from a neighbouring village and is now pregnant by him. Nanni a young boy arrives at the village to be a new student at the school. A friendship develops between Nanni and Yamuna. Udapa is desperate for money. He goes off to raise funds for the school. The students are unruly and bully Nanni. Then the village learn of Yamuna’s pregnancy and want her to be excommunicated from the village. Yamuna’s lover arranges an abortion for her. When Udupa returns and learns what’s happened he performs a ritual to make his daughter an outcast. Throughout such dreadful persecution Nanni is the only person to support Yamuna.
Early on there’s a strong feeling of predictability about The Ritual that all will bode ill for Yamuna (stoically well acted by Meena Kuttappa). However Kasaravelli’s direction avoids any over-emphasis neither on her suffering nor for the absence of empathy shown by the villagers. It’s a distanced, non-judgemental approach that in its matter of fact manner reveals a pitiless view of cruel behaviour supported by a repressive moral code. And the director’s detachment avoids any irony and cynicism. It simply says this is reality. It’s up to you whether things change or not. I’m showing how things are. I’m not telling you to do something about an unjust community when the rules of religion are broken.
This might have appeared cold hearted if Kasaravelli hadn’t shown the intense bonding of child (Nanni is eloquently acted by Ajit Kumar) and adult. Also this doesn’t become an obvious mother / son type relationship but more the temporary journey and flight of two kindred and misunderstood spirits.
Shadows are used highly effectively in The Ritual. They work metaphorically to suggest being pursued by dark and irrational forces and also how the woman and boy could be reduced to a shadow of their former self because of their disobedience. Interestingly Yamuna doesn’t protest but the innocent Nanni does all the protesting. The young will grow up to be psychologically marred and may or may not change the social order.
Outstanding lighting and some powerful night photography accompany a tracking camera that halts only when it needs to and then moves on with an inevitable and succinct rhythm. I particularly admired the scene when an untouchable beggar named Dalif, played by an uncredited local extra, yielding a flaming torch to light the way, accompanies Nanni through the woods to search for the body of the abandoned Yamuna. At one point Nanni goes to touch the beggar but the caste system causes him to recoil at the boy’s attempt to kindly reach out. This politically charged moment can be placed alongside the angry banging on the doors and wooden caged windows of Yamuna’s house by the locals; the abortion attempt sequence; the indifference of her lover who pays to get rid of the baby then calmly cycles back home to his village and the dark process of Yamuna’s final ritualistic banishment.
The Ritual deservedly won awards for its direction, acting, screenplay, photography and music. And Girish Kasaravalli went on to make 15 feature films and a couple of documentaries that won him even more awards. He presented the restored The Ritual at this year’s Venice film festival; 47 years on after its release we have a raw, intense and outstanding example of the Indian New Wave. I’m left impatient to explore Kasaravalli’s other films.
Alan Price©2026
By Alan Price • added recently on London Grip, film, film archive • Tags: Alan Price, film, film archive