4K restoration of Satyajit Ray's Shatranj Ke Khiladi to be screened at Venice International Film Festival

Ahead of the 45th anniversary of Satyajit Ray’s Shatranj Ke Khiladi (1977), a 4K restoration of the Hindi film by the National Film Archive of India will be premiered at the 79th edition of the Venice International Film Festival.

Based on a story by Munshi Premchand, Shatranj Ke Khilari stars Amjad Khan, Sanjeev Kumar, Saeed Jaffrey and Richard Attenborough.

Sadgati and Shatranj Ke Khilari: Satyajit Ray's tryst with Hindi cinema and Premchand

The former director of the archive, Prakash Magdum, announced the news on Twitter.

The Ray film will be screened in the Venice Classics section, which was put on hold for the past two years due to the coronavirus pandemic. The Hindi film is among the 18 selected for this year’s edition; it will be screened alongside Jean Renoir's The Elusive Corporal (1962) and Frank Lloyd's Cavalcade (1933).

The Italian festival, which will be held from 31 August to 10 September, features actress Julianne Moore as the president of the international jury alongside filmmakers Mariano Cohn, Leonardo Di Costanzo, Audrey Diwan, Rodrigo Sorogoyen, actress Leila Hatami and author-screenwriter Kazuo Ishiguro.