Two
About Two
A rich boy at his window and a street boy with almost no toys try to top each other, and neither speaks. The rich boy answers a flute with a toy trumpet, then a homemade mask and a bow with a drawer full of masks, swords, and guns. When the street boy flies a kite, the rich boy brings it down with a slingshot and a toy air rifle. The street boy goes back to his hut with the torn kite. The rich boy's toys all start making noise, and the flute cuts through them as a toy robot knocks over a tower.
Cast & crew
More about Two
PBS asked Esso World Theater for a short from India in English. Ray, who wanted a Bengali setting, answered with a film that has no dialogue. Soumendu Roy photographed it and Dulal Dutta cut it.
Themes
Making
Ray was asked for English dialogue and refused it. The contest is carried by objects: bottled drink, trumpet, masks, kite, rifle, flute.
Look
Soumendu Roy shot it in black and white, cutting between the window of the house and the street boy's hut.
Music
Satyajit Ray wrote the music. There is no dialogue. The last sound is the street boy's flute against the mechanical toys.
Preservation
The Academy Film Archive restored Two in 2006, one of 19 Ray films in that project.
Notes
- Ravi Kiran plays the rich boy. Babu Biswas plays the street boy.
- One of three Indian shorts Esso World Theater made for American television.
- Ray treated the silence as a nod to silent cinema, not as a missing soundtrack.
- The Academy Film Archive restored the picture in 2006.
- Sandip Ray later printed the English script in a book of his father's scripts.
Scenes
- The street boy answers the toy trumpet with a small drum.
- A slingshot, then a toy air rifle, brings the kite down.
- A toy robot walks into a tower of toys and knocks it over while the flute plays.
