Ratra Aarambh

Ratra Aarambh
Poster
Directed by	Ajay Phansekar
Produced by	Laxmi Venkatesh Films
Starring	Dilip Prabhavalkar Deepak Shirke Dilip Kulkarni Anand Abhyankar Pradeep Patwardhan Rajan Tamhane
Release date(s)	1999
Country	India
Language	Marathi

Ratra Aarambh (Devnagari: रात्र आरंभ) is a thriller Marathi movie directed by Ajay Phansekar released in India in 1999 starring Dilip Prabhavalkar as an old man suffering from split personality.

The story revolves around the two worlds inhabited by Vasudeo Balwant Thombre - Dilip Prabhavalkar - an ordinary senior citizen who is an avid reader of crime fiction. Living his normal life by day, he is transformed into his fantasy world by night. This is the world in which he imagines himself to be a blind industrialist who is the target of conspiracies of his near and dear ones. This schizophrenia leads to a tragedy in his real life and he ends up at a mental asylum where the psychiatrists try to separate the fantasy from reality so that he can lead his normal life once again. The film has a powerful performance by Dilip Prabhawalkar in the central role. Prabhavalkar won the Filmfare award for his role.

A similar South Indian movie, called "Aparichit", was released on this subject.