AllMovie

With a touch of Bollywood color and melodrama, and a whole lot of heart -- along the lines of a Satyajit Ray classic -- The Festival tracks three generations of an Indian family at its annual reunion during the religious celebration Durga Puja. Madhabi Mukherjee stars as the matriarch of the family whose fortune is at stake, or rather, dwindling. As a distant cousin calls in to save the day, the family members, chiefly the three beautiful but very different sisters, await the outcome. The story's tension is in the deeper drama which unfolds involving one of the sibling's pasts. With all of the vibrant color of the subcontinent, extraordinary interiors, and snapshots of daily Indian life, Ghosh has crafted yet another of his signature humanist pieces, topping even his last beautiful slice-of-life pic Bariwali (The Lady of the House).