Ritesh Batra shares his top five Indian dramas of all time, as his newest feature arrives in cinemas.

Filmmaker Ritesh Batra arrived to wide acclaim with his box office smash The Lunchbox, starring Irrfan Khan. Taking away a Cannes prize and a BAFTA nomination, he followed his debut with a one-two punch of English-language films in 2017. Batra directed Robert Redford and Jane Fonda in Netflix film Our Souls at Night and adapted Julian Barnes’ award-winning novel The Sense of an Ending.



Now he returns to his native Mumbai, reuniting with The Lunchbox star Nawazuddin Siddiqui for Photograph, which premiered at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival to warm praise. “This is a real-world romance without the fanfare,” writes festival ticket-holder Mike Bayles on Letterboxd. “It warms the heart from a deeper, more authentic place.”

Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Sanya Malhotra and director Ritesh Batra.

Rafi (played by Siddiqui) is a struggling street photographer who convinces a shy stranger, Molini (Sanya Malhotra), to pose as his fiancée to satisfy his family’s pressure for him to get married. When his elderly grandmother insists on meeting her, the pair develop an unexpected connection in spite of their vast cultural differences.

While the romantic premise was inspired by exuberant Bollywood musicals and Shakespeare’s comedy The Taming of the Shrew, Batra wanted to tell “a very real story about people living in Mumbai today and to have more of a feeling of an independent arthouse film than a Bollywood extravaganza”.

In keeping with the spirit of his roots and style, we asked Batra for his top five Indian dramas of all time. His list—all highly rated by our members—includes a mandatory Satyajit Ray classic and an Ivory Merchant outing. See the list on Letterboxd or read on for more.

Ritesh Batra Recommends: Five of the Best Indian Films

1. Pyaasa (1957)

Directed by Guru Dutt

A classic musical about a struggling poet trying to get his work published in post-independence India. Pyaasa translates to ‘wistful’, which perfectly sums up the tone of Ritesh Batra’s filmmaking. He shares his choice for favorite Indian movie with Bollywood actors Aamir Khan and Shraddha Kapoor and it ranked number 160 on Sight & Sound’s all-time 2002 poll. “It’s not just poetic in itself but it understands the poetry as the fuel of human soul, as something that connects us and makes us who we are,” raves Still Here.

2. Garm Hava (1974)

Directed by M.S. Sathyu

After the joy of Pyaasa, Garm Hava is a more serious film that deals with the post-Partition plight of Muslims in 1940s India. Its influence was so impactful that it’s credited with pioneering a new wave in Hindi Cinema. The 2014 restoration is awaiting home distribution, but those who have seen it say it’s a “contender for both the greatest Indian film of all time and greatest performance by an Indian actor [star Balraj Sahni]”. Ritesh Batra agrees.

3. The Big City (1963)

Directed by Satyajit Ray

Fortunately for us, Satyajit Ray’s films are well preserved and you can stream The Big City on our favorite new toy The Criterion Channel. His 1963 film makes history with its subversive take on working women challenging the patriarchy. It ranks in Letterboxd’s top 200 of all time and our members discover and decipher it every day. “There’s such a compelling mixture of melodrama and matter-of-factness in The Big City that it feels impossible to nail down,” notes Alex.

4. Shakespeare-Wallah (1965)

Directed by James Ivory

Shakespeare-Wallah is only the second of 23 films Oscar-winner James Ivory directed using Ruth Prawer Jhabvala’s scripts, and it made a big impression on Ritesh Batra early on. It follows a troupe of English actors who travel around India performing Shakespeare’s plays, and covers a transitional phase where Bollywood begins to replace theater. Fun fact: Satyajit Ray composed the score. Letterboxd members praise the “incredibly beautiful and effective black-and-white photography”.

5. Salaam Bombay! (1988)

Directed by Mira Nair

Bollywood’s second-ever movie nominated for an Oscar, Mira Nair’s drama sticks to the streets of Bombay, viewing life’s struggles through the eyes of twelve-year-old Chaipu. According to Dany, it’s a film “that doesn’t hold back even for a second” and marks a notable achievement for women filmmakers, with a female director/producer, screenwriter and cinematographer.

Distributed by Amazon Studios, ‘Photograph’ is in US cinemas now.