One day, a large blimp shows up over a small Bulgarian village. The townspeople, seeing the prosperity in all that beautiful silk and then some, go after it.

“It was fear that created the first gods.”

– Stratius

“Thus, I do not see what use there is in those mills of the gods said to grind so late as to render punishment hard to be recognized, and to make wickedness fearless”

– Plutarch, Moralia (1 A.D.)

“Hitching at this hour.”

Feeling rather peckish.

“Are the birds gonna eat us, Mommy?”

Set in 1950s Calcutta, মহানগর is a story of emancipation in a changing society. Arati (Madhavi Mukherjee) is a housewife from a traditionalist family, who – in order to support her relatives' lavish demands – goes out to work as a door-to-door saleswoman. Slowly, she discovers her independence.

“I've got it. Film star! You'd be perfect. Dark glasses, lots of red lipstick, and 100,000 rupees per picture. And if it's a Hindi film, we'll all fly to Bombay.”

– Bani

The Hypnotic Eye utilises what's called the movie gimmick. This one doesn't deploy anything hugely spectacular, no Percepto! seat vibrators (The Tingler (1959)) or Witchcraft (1964) witch deflectors or even a trained nurse on standby. There's a balloon. No spoilers here

“And now I am going to demonstrate to you the power of your own mind.”

– Desmond

There are also multiple moments where hypnotist Desmond (handsome future-Revlon-exec Jacques Bergerac) directly addresses you, the (wo)man in the audience. Because you too may laugh at that folly, that gimmick, that parlour trick. But who says it isn't real? Who says you really never went to see a hypnotism show…?

– What do you want?

– We just want that horse of yours.

– You want my horse, there's an awful lot of ya. What are you gonna do with just one horse, anyhow?

– Eat it. We're gonna feed off that beast for at least a week.