Son of the legendary filmmaker Satyajit Ray, Sandip Ray was born in Calcutta in 1953. Sandip grew up with film making with his father Satyajit Ray, the legendary film maker from India. Before he was 10-year-old, Sandip started writing rhymes, illustrating his own writings and also created original comic strips for Sandesh , a children's magazine edited by his father. His interest in cinema developed at an early age. When he was only eight, he wrote his first screenplay - illustrated with drawings of all the shots - based on a story by his own great grandfather. He nearly always used to visit his father's shooting as well as editing in the studios. He began, in 1970, his career in cinema as a still photographer on the sets of Ray's Pratiddwandi (The Adversory).

In 1976 he started his professional career as one of the assistant directors to Satyajit Ray. Deeply interested in photography since childhood, Sandip took over the duty of operating the camera during the shooting of the last three Ray films.   Phatikchand (Phatik and the Juggler) , Sandip's own first independent feature film, won the National Award for both direction and film. His second creation, based on an unpublished story by Satyajit Ray, completed the "Goopy and Bagha" trilogy.

Sandip Ray's Hindi film Target is one of the most celebrated Indian films ever commercially released in the United States. Major foreign critics in all major US newspapers hailed Target. One of them compared the impact of Target with that of the cinema created by the maestros like Kurosawa, Satyajit Ray and David Lean. Target is a remarkable milestone in the entire history of Indian cinema. He made a good number of films and serials for television, many of which were based on his father's stories.

In 2003 he added, to great acclaim, a new film for big screen on Feluda, the popular detective created by Satyajit Ray. Since then he has directed several Feluda Movies. “Kailashey Kelenkari” released in Dec 2007 will be screened in Bangamela. Apart from doing films, Sandip has recently started editing Sandesh, a well-known children's magazine founded by Upendrakishore Ray Chaudhuri and edited before Sandip by Sukumar, Satyajit and Bijoya Ray.

Satyajit Ray on Sandip

“Sandip is handicapped by the additional weight of being my son. His latest work The Return of Goopy & Bagha is cent percent his own work. Only the plot and a few songs were mine. But the direction, the photography, the script were all Sandip's. In his handling of the camera, he is a master. His skill is better than mine. The bravura work of his cinematography is incomparable” - said Satyajit Ray in his last interview given on 4 th January, 1992, to Tim McGrick of the The Independent , London.

His filmography :

    * Phatikchand (Phatik and the Juggler), 1983 ( Best feature film, Vancouver International Film Festival 1984).

    * Goopy Bagha Phire Elo (The Return of Goopy and Bagha), 1991 ( Akira Kurosawa Award, San Fransisco International Film Festival 1992).

    * Uttaran (The Broken Journey), 1993 ( Glauber Rocha Award as the best political film, Chili 1994).

    * Target, 1995 ( The best film of the festival according to the viewers' opinion in Sydney International Film Festival 1996).

    * Bombaier Bombete (Bandits from Bombay), 2003  

    * Nishijapan (After the Night Dawn), 2005

    * Kailashe Kelenkari , 2007

Television Films, Shorts and Documentaries :

    * Satyajit Ray Presents II (Three short films), 1986-87

    * Kishore Kumar, Documentary on the legendary singer, 1988

    * Feluda 30 (Five short films), 1996-97

    * Satyajiter Gappo (Ray Stories), Four short films, 1999

    * Dr. Munshir Diary (Dr. Munshi's Diary), 2000

    * Satyajiter Priyo Galpo (Ray's Favourite Stories), seven short films, 2001

    * Eker Pithe Dui ( 2 Upon 1 ), 12 short films, 2001

    * Mayar Khela , based on a dance-drama (Opera) by Rabindranath Tagore, 2002