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Feature Film – 108mn
B&W
Sinhala with English subtitles
Screenplay Regi Siriwardena
Cinematography William Blake
Music W.D. Amaradeva
Cast Henry Jayasena, Punya Heendeniya, Wickrema Bogoda, Trilicia Gunawardene
Format 35mm – Mono
Genre Drama
First ralease 1965 (France)
Restored version 2008
Awards 1965: Golden Peacock at the Grand Prix International Film Festival in India Golden Head of Palenque in Mexico, Best Director and Best Film awards at the Sarasaviya Film Festival
Production Anton Wickremasinghe
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Synopsis Piyal is a handsome young teacher who is hired to teach English to Nanda, a member of a high class family. They fall in love, but can’t elope because Piyal is of a lower class. Nanda’s parents instead push her into a marriage with Jinadasa who is of the same class as them. With economic downturn in Sri Lanka, both families lose their status and Jinadasa leaves to try to make a better life for himself; he never achieves his goal and dies penniless. Piyal and Nanda can now finally come together. They have changed however, and the earlier idylic nature of their relationship is not recaptured.
About Lester James Peries admired Martin Wickramsinghe’s work and was inspired to attempt an adoption of Wickramasinghe’s novel Gamperaliya into a movie in 1964. Wickremasinghe was initially reluctant thinking it wouldn’t make a good movie, but eventually agreed. Scholar Regie Siriwardene was asked to script the film. Playwright Ediriweera Sarachchandra championed the film writing “At last a Sinhalese film has been made which we could show the world without having to hide our heads in shame. I want to say a great film has been made of a great novel.”
Selected filmography of Lester James Peries(born in 1919)
1956 – Rekava (Line of Destiny)
1965 – Gamperaliya (The Changing Village)
1967 – Ran Salu (The Yellow Robe)
1970 – Nidhanaya (The Treasure)
1978 – Ahasin Polawata
(White Flowers for the Dead)
1983 – Yuganthaya (The end of an era)
2002 – Wekande Walauwa (Mansion by the Lake)
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