France
1951
99 minutes
Color
1.33:1
English
276
Director Jean Renoir’s entrancing first color feature—shot entirely on location in India—is a visual tour de force. Based on the novel by Rumer Godden, the film eloquently contrasts the growing pains of three young women with the immutability of the holy Bengal River, around which their daily lives unfold. Enriched by Renoir’s subtle understanding and appreciation for India and its people, The River gracefully explores the fragile connections between transitory emotions and everlasting creation.
| The mother | Nora Swinburne |
| The father | Esmond Knight |
| Mr. John | Arthur Shields |
| Nan | Suprova Mukerjee |
| Captain John | Thomas E. Breen |
| Harriet | Patricia Walters |
| Melanie | Radha |
| Valerie | Adrienne Corri |
| Bogey | Richard Foster |
| Elizabeth | Penelope Wilkinson |
| Muffie | Jane Harris |
| Mouse | Jennifer Harris |
| Victoria | Cecelia Wood |
| Ram | Singh Sajjan Singh |
| Kanu | Nimai Barik |
| Director | Jean Renoir |
| Producer | Kenneth McEldowney |
| Screenplay | Rumer Godden and Jean Renoir |
| Adapted from the novel by | Rumer Godden |
| Production Design | Eugene Lourie |
| Art director | Bansi Chandragupta |
| Cinematography | Claude Renoir Sr. |
| Camera operator | Ramanada Sen Gupta |
| Editing | George Gale |
| Music and technical advisor | M.A. Partha Sarathy |
In town for the New York Film Festival screenings of his much-admired A Christmas Tale, French director Arnaud Desplechin talked to Dennis Lim about his always allusive filmmaking style and his particular influences in making this dysfunctional-family holiday film, including Ingmar Bergman’s...
“A film about India without elephants and tiger hunts”—this was how Jean Renoir described what drew him to The River. Guided by Rumer Godden’s autobiographical novel, he rejected the India of exotic action and spectacle to make a meditative, almost mystical film set beside a tributary...
Jean Renoir’s hopes for a Hollywood production of The River had languished for two years when, in November 1948, a meeting with a Beverly Hills florist sent him on a reconnaissance trip to Calcutta. This inspired an unexpected independent film of great visual beauty and unconventional structure...
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