Shatranj Ke Khilari aka The Chess Players is a 1977 Indian film written and directed by Satyajit Ray, based on Munshi Premchand's short story of the same name. Amjad Khan plays the role of Wajid Ali Shah, King of Awadh, and Richard Attenborough plays the role of General James Outram.
The film also features the actors Sanjeev Kumar, Saeed Jaffrey, Shabana Azmi, Farooque Shaikh, David Abraham, and Tom Alter, as well as Amitabh Bachchan as the narrator. This is the first hindi feature film of filmmaker Satyajit Ray and second being 'Sadgati'- another adaptation of Premchand's short story.
Satyajit Ray, an Indian filmmaker and among the dozen or so great masters of world cinema, is known for his humanistic approach to cinema. He made his films in Bengali, a language spoken in the eastern state of India - West Bengal. And yet, his films are of universal interest. They are about things that make up the human race - relationships, emotions, struggle, conflicts, joys and sorrows.
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