Bhumika (Hindi: भुमिका, Urdu: بھُمِکا, English: The Role) is a 1977 Indian film directed by Shyam Benegal. The movie stars Smita Patil, Amol Palekar, Anant Nag, Naseeruddin Shah and Amrish Puri.

This film is broadly based on the memoirs of the well-known Marathi Stage and screen actress of the 1940s, 'Hansa Wadkar' who led a flamboyant and unconventional life and focus at an individual's search for identity and self-fulfillment.Smita Patil gave the strong performance of transforming herself in its course from a vivacious teenage girl to a wiser but deeply wounded middle-aged woman.

The film won two National Film Awards and Filmfare Best Movie Award, it was invited to Carthage Film Festival 1978, Chicago Film Festival, where it was awarded the Golden Plaque 1978, and in 1986 it was invited to Festival of Images, Algeria.

A role or a social role is a set of connected behaviours, rights and obligations as conceptualised by actors in a social situation. It is an expected or free or continuously changing behaviour and may have a given individual social status or social position. It is vital to both functionalist and interactionist understandings of society. Social role posits the following about social behaviour:

Roles may be achieved or ascribed or they can be accidental in different situations. An achieved role is a position that a person assumes voluntarily which reflects personal skills, abilities, and effort. An ascribed role is a position assigned to individuals or groups without regard for merit but because of certain traits beyond their control, (Stark 2007), and is usually forced upon a person.

Roles can be semi-permanent ("doctor", "mother", "child"), or they can be transitory. A well-known example is the sick role as formulated by Talcott Parsons in the late 1940s. In the transitory "sick role", a person is exempted from his usual roles, but is expected to conform to transitory behavioural standards, such as following doctors' orders and trying to recover.

Shyam Benegal (born 14 December 1934, Hyderabad) is a prolific Indian director and screenwriter. With his first four feature films Ankur (1973), Nishant (1975), Manthan (1976) and Bhumika (1977) he created a new genre, which has now come to be called the "middle cinema" in India. He has expressed dislike of the term, preferring his work to be called New or Alternate cinema.

He was awarded the Padma Shri in 1976 and the Padma Bhushan in 1991. On 8 August 2007, Benegal was awarded the highest award in Indian cinema for lifetime achievement, the Dadasaheb Phalke Award for the year 2005. He has won the National Film Award for Best Feature Film in Hindi seven times.

Shyam Benegal, was born in a Konkani Chitrapur Saraswat Brahmin family on 14 December 1934 in Trimulgherry,Secunderabad then a British Cantonment, and now a twin city of the state capital, Hyderabad. It was here, at age twelve that he made his first film, on a camera given to him by his photographer father Sridhar B. Benegal. He received an M.A. in Economics, from Nizam College, Osmania University, Hyderabad. There he formed the Hyderabad Film Society.

Smita Patil (17 October 1955 – 13 December 1986) was an Indian actress of film, television and theatre. Regarded among the finest stage and film actresses of her times, Patil appeared in over 75 Hindi and Marathi films in a career that spanned just over a decade. During her career, she received two National Film Awards and a Filmfare Award. She was the recipient of the Padma Shri, India's fourth-highest civilian honour in 1985.

Patil graduated from the Film and Television Institute of India in Pune and made her film debut with Shyam Benegal's Charandas Chor (1975). She became one of the leading actresses of parallel cinema, a New Wave movement in India cinema, though she also appeared in several mainstream movies throughout her career. Her performances were often acclaimed, and her most notable roles include Manthan (1977), Bhumika (1977), Aakrosh (1980), Chakra (1981), Chidambaram (1985) and Mirch Masala (1985).

Apart from acting, Patil was an active feminist (in a distinctly Indian context) and a member of the Women's Centre in Mumbai. She was deeply committed to the advancement of women's issues, and gave her endorsement to films which sought to explore the role of women in traditional Indian society, their sexuality, and the changes facing the middle-class woman in an urban milieu.