So you think Star Wars is the best trilogy ever made? Watch Satyajit Ray's directorial debut (then follow up with its sequels, Aparajito and Apur Sansar) and you might reconsider.
Pather Panchali is indeed an Indian film, but in its black-and-white simplicity and documentary-style approach, it's closer to the Italian neorealist school that gave us Bicycle Thieves.
Ray captures the rhythms of life in a poor, rural village in minute detail, filtering family experiences through the eyes of a young boy.
Realism and idealism sit side by side in the dust, but the latter is never crushed by the former, and the overall effect is one of great beauty and humanity.