In the digital age it’s difficult to get through a day where we don’t view media in some shape or form. We are constantly bombarded by a never-ending stream of information in the form of television ads, online videos, and other evolving forms media (ie. SnapChat, Tik Tok). In the present context, it's easy to become conditioned to the omnipresence of media and forget that the content we obsessively consume is underlied by advancements made by filmmakers of the past. So, in order to understand how and why media affects us the way it does, it's important to step back and reminisce on some historical cinema. 

 

Two is a short film directed by one of the most acclaimed filmmakers in the history of Indian and international cinema, Satyajit Ray. To any film enthusiast, Ray’s films are a must-watch as they educate one on a humanistic approach to cinema and demonstrate the profundity of simple storytelling. Two, one of Ray’s lesser-known but most critically-acclaimed works, deals with the story of two young boys as they childishly compete to see who is better. The richer boy, lounging in his lavish house with modern luxuries, fighting boredom and complacency, hears a boy who lives in a nearby hut playing a simple tune on his clarinet. Put off by the boy’s happiness, the richer boy plays his own, more expensive clarinet. Hearing the instrument and sensing contempt, the poor boy starts playing his drum set to which the rich boy smugly responds by winding his toy of a monkey playing drums. In this way, the rich boy asserts his socioeconomic superiority in every regard, going as far as to shoot down the other’s kite. In the end, satisfied with his attempts at extinguishing the poor boy’s enjoyment, the rich boy turns on all of his wind-up toys but even through the din, can hear the poor boy resume playing his clarinet. Dejected, the rich boy sits on his bed as a gust of wind knocks his toys down.

    

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

     

 

This plot of a childish rivalry, though riddled with many interesting technical and narrative details, is an uncomplicated story. This simple film has nothing to hide. It’s staging, costuming, lighting, or set design doesn’t seek to distract the viewer. It’s become a fad nowadays to lavishly garnish sets and costumes with extraneous detail. Now, I completely agree that intricacy in set design is an artisan skill which is to be respected. If the atmosphere of the film needs to achieve a specific tone or historical feel, then emphasis on factors other than the immediate plot are integral in making the film believable. Moreover, its difficult to truly express disdain for any film crew that’s committed to devoting volumes of time to achieve painstaking perfection for a shot that may last only several seconds. However, if that perfect shot doesn’t serve a succinct purpose, the whole endeavour is futile. Even to the non-critical film viewer there is a point after which it becomes exhausting to watch a film since the filmmaker’s obscured intentionality has to be searched for in an unorganized visual pool of fabrics, makeup, and colour. Two takes a step away from all of those complications and presents a format that doesn’t assault the eyes or the mind.     

 

Perfection, when paired with purpose, is the driver of good cinema. Retaining perfection but discarding purpose is a recipe for disaster.   

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

One of the first things that hits you about this film is the dialogue (or the lack thereof). This is a silent film where music and sound take the place of verbiage. In this film, music is used as a vehicle for communicating the state of either normalcy or tension between the lead characters. In times of regularity, when the rich boy is content and unencumbered by the poor boy, the music is upbeat and carefree. However, in times of conflict, the music builds and reflects the ambiance. Ray had actually composed the music in this film, making the effect that much more pointed.   

 

The use of camera to capture a scene is the bread and butter of every filmmaker since it gives them complete creative freedom to frame the shot however they choose. Especially in the context of film (as compared to television), a larger production budget means that there are more exotic ways in which the camera can contort a visual scene. However, many of these techniques, as complicated as they may be to set up, mimic the eye’s natural movement. Panning, tilting, trucking, all of these shots mimic different visual stimulus that we’re generally used to. Zooming, however, is interesting in this way since the human eye can’t mimic it, thus making it a unique and powerful type of camera movement. Over the years, however, this technique has been losing its once-significant position in the hierarchy of camera manipulation as directors now feel that the overuse of zoom can make a film feel dated.  

 

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

Now, the reason I bring up zooming is because its use is central to Ray’s execution of emotion. In Two, there are a total of six zoom shots, all of which are zooming in and three of which are devoted to the rich boy while the other three are devoted to the poor boy. Zooming out of a subject reveals information and can serve to place a subject in an environmental context. However, zooming into a subject makes the viewing experience more personal and if the zoom is held for too long, it can even make the audience uncomfortable. There is a stark contrast between the situations in which zooming occurs for each character, perhaps hinting at Ray’s intent. The rich boy’s face is zoomed into only (apart from the first shot in the film) when he is frustrated by the poor boy’s freedom and happiness. On the other hand, the poor boy’s face is zoomed into when he is disappointed by how his toys are being overshadowed. The common emotion between both characters is discouragement and the common cause is the rich boy.      

 

After watching the film a few times (and doing quite a lot of reading), I realized that the props in the film were more than just objects. In fact, Ray was trying to deconstruct and communicate his anti-war sentiments, specifically in relation to the Vietnam war. This seems like a tall order for a film that lasts barely fifteen minutes, but when probed carefully, the message comes through. Let me paint the picture for you. The rich boy, with all of the luxuries he enjoys, seems to have a short attention span and needs to be occupied in either consumption or destruction. There are a lot of products that he consumes: Coca-cola, match sticks, gum, the apple. It’s as if eating is a pastime for him. But notice, he never finishes the thing he’s consuming. He takes several gulps of soda, then he’s bored. He chews the gum for a while, but he tires of this too and sticks the gum on his toy robot. His behaviour implicitly signals that he doesn’t view these objects with gratitude but with complacency and egocentrism in mind. Another activity that this boy likes is to take risks and ‘destroy’ things. He plays with fire, he pops balloons, he doesn’t like seeing others happy. He does the things he does for no other motivation than boredom and entitlement. Now, my extreme judgement of a little boy for his fickle nature might come across as unwarranted and far too harsh, but this chubby little boy is, in fact, not a boy at all. Could he perhaps be an allegorical representation of modern America (or even the modern consumer culture)? I’ll leave it to you to try and deduce the connections between the character and the representation. By extension, what can the poor boy be interpreted as? 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

​

 

In this light, the ending of the film is quite significant. No matter how much the rich boy tries to dampen the spirits poor boy, he finds a way to recover and find happiness in something else. Meanwhile, the rich boy sits, dejected, in the acoustic chaos of his expensive toys, unable to find his own happiness. There are an endless number of real-life situations that this can be a model for. When you saw the film for the first time, you didn’t think it was this deep, did you?           

 

This wasn’t my first foray into films of past decades, but it was the first time that I took a technical approach to evaluating such a film. It was highly rewarding to understand the inner workings of what it means to be a good director and make a ‘critically-acclaimed’ film. I encourage you all to start looking at film of earlier eras and dissecting what makes them significant. Trust me. Once you see and learn some things, you can never unsee and unlearn them. This is a valuable asset in making sense of a world that is as media-driven as our modern world is.