Lal Pathore

Lal Pathore (Bengali pronunciation: [lal paθor] transl. The Red Stone) is a 1964 Indian Bengali-language period action drama film co-written and directed by Sushil Majumder. Produced by Subhas Ranjan Basu under the banner of Esarby Productions, the film stars Uttam Kumar, Supriya Devi, Nirmal Kumar and Srabani Basu in lead roles, while Rabi Ghosh, Raja Mukherjee, Mani Srimani and Majumder himself play another pivotal roles.

Based on a story by Prashanta Chowdhury, the film follows the transformation of a light-hearted king into an arrogant, when he becomes obsessed with a girl younger than him, because of a curse regarding his royal ancestors.

The film pairs Kumar and Devi for the seventh time, and also marks their only collaboration with Majumder. Music of the film is composed by Salil Chowdhury, with lyrics penned by himself and Gulzar in his debut in Bengali cinema. Filming took places in Kolkata, Alipurduar and Agra, while some sequences were shot in Fatehpur Sikri, being the first Bengali film to be picturized there. Its cinematography was handled by Bijoy Ghosh, with editing by Ardhendu Chatterjee and Debi Ganguly.

Lal Pathore was theatrically released on 6 November 1964, coinciding with Kali Puja. It opened to positive response both critically and commercially; it got appraisal for its story, cinematography, score and the notable performances by both Kumar and Devi in negative roles. It was later remade by Majumder himself into Hindi as Lal Patthar (1971) starring Raaj Kumar, Hema Malini, Rakhee Gulzar and Vinod Mehra in the lead.