Actor / Director Profile

Sergei Bondarchuk was one of the most important Russian filmmakers, best known for directing an Academy Award-winning film epic Voyna i mir (1967), based on the book by Leo Tolstoy, in which he also starred as Pierre Bezukhov.He was born Sergei Fedorovich Bondarchuk on September, 25, 1920, in the village of Belozerka, Kherson province, Ukraine, Russian Federation (now Belozerka, Ukraine). He was brought up in Southern Ukraine, then in Azov and Taganrog, Rostov province, Russia. Young Bondarchuk was fond of literature and theatre, he was a voracious reader of books by such authors as Anton Chekhov and Leo Tolstoy. He made his stage debut in 1937, on the stage of the Chekhov Drama Theatre in the city of Taganrog, near Rostov, then studied acting at Rostov Theatrical School. In 1942 his studies were interrupted by the invasion of the Nazi Armies during the World War II. Bondarchuk was recruited in the Red Army and served for four years until he was discharged in 1946, after becoming a prisoner of war. From 1946 - 1948 he attended the State Institute of Cinematography in Moscow (VGIK), graduating as an actor from the class of Sergei Gerasimov. In 1948 he made his film debut in Povest o nastoyashchem cheloveke (1948) then co-starred in Molodaya gvardiya (1948).He received acclaim for his portrayal of the title character in Taras Shevchenko (1951), for which he was awarded the State Prize of the USSR, and was designated People's Artist of the USSR, becoming the youngest actor ever to receive such honor. Then he starred in the internationally renowned adaptation of the Shakespeare's Otello (1955), in which he played the title role opposite Irina Skobtseva as Desdemona. Bondarchuk expressed his own experience as a soldier of the World War II when he starred in Sudba cheloveka (1959), the acclaimed war drama based on the eponymous story by Mikhail Sholokhov, which was also Bondarchuk's directorial debut that earned him the prestigious Lenin's Prize of the USSR in 1960.Bondarchuk shot to international fame with Voyna i mir (1967), a powerful adaptation of the eponymous masterpiece by Leo Tolstoy. The 7-hour-long film epic won the 1968 Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, and brought Bondarchuk a reputation of one of the finest directors of his generation. Recognized as the most expensive project in film history, Voyna i mir (1967) was produced over seven years, from 1961 to 1968, at an estimated cost of $100,000,000 (over $700,000,000 adjusted for inflation in 2008). The film set several records, such as involving tens of thousands of actors and extras from the Red Army in filming of the 3rd two-hour-long episode about the historic Battle of Borodino against the Napoleon's invasion, making it the largest battle scene ever filmed. Bondarchuk also made history by introducing several remote-controlled cameras that were moving on 300 meter-long wires above the scene of the battlefield. Having earned international critical acclaim for Voyna i mir (1967), he starred in the SFR Yugoslavian epic Bitka na Neretvi (1969) with fellow Russian, Yul Brynner, and Orson Welles, whom he would direct the following year.By the late 1960s Bondarchuk was acclaimed around the world and earned many awards and nominations, becoming one of the most awarded actor and director in the Soviet Union. However, he was still not a member of the Soviet Communist Party, a fact that could not remain without attention from the Soviet leadership under Leonid Brezhnev. Soon he received an official recommendation to join the Soviet Communist Party, an offer that nobody in the Soviet Union could refuse without risking a career. At that time Bondarchuk was often heard making humorous comparisons of his situation with the historic Hollywood trials of filmmakers, albeit in a different political environment in the United States during the 50s. Bondarchuk was able to avoid the Communist Party in his earlier career, but things changed in the Soviet Union under Brezhnev, so in 1970, Bondarchuk accepted the trade-off and joined the Soviet Communist Party for the sake of protecting his film career. In 1971 he was elected the Chairman of the Union of Cinematographers, a semi-government post in the Soviet system of politically controlled culture. Eventually he underwent a gradual evolution into a politically controlled figure and turned to making such politically charged films as Krasnye kolokola, film pervyy - Meksika v ogne (1982) and other such films. Later, during the liberalization of the Soviet Union under Mikhail Gorbachev, Bondarchuk was seen as a symbol of conservatism in Soviet cinema, so in 1986 he was voted out of the office.Bondarchuk was the first Russian director to make a big budget international co-production with the financial backing of Italian producer Dino De Laurentiis, such as Waterloo (1970/I), a Russian-Italian co-production vividly reconstructing the final battle of the Napoleonic Wars. This was his first English-language production, but several Russian actors were cast, e.g. Sergo Zaqariadze and Oleg Vidov. In this film, Orson Welles, his co-star in Bitka na Neretvi (1969) made two cameos as the old King Louis XVII of France. It appeared Bondarchuk was unable to control the scenery-chewing advances of Rod Steiger, and the film was a commercial flop in Europe and America, but it gained the favour of critics.After his dismissal as Chairman of the Union of Cinematographers he started the shooting of TV mini-series, and his second and last production in English in 1989: Quiet Flows the Don (2006) based on the eponymous novel by the Nobel Prize winner Mikhail Sholokhov, with Rupert Everett as the lead. At the end of filming, and before post-production, Bondarchuk had several meetings with his Italian producers, where he learned about some unfavorable details in his contract, causing a bitter dispute with the producers over the rights to the film during the last two years of his life. Amidst this legal battle the production was stopped and the film was stored in a bank vault, and remained unedited and undubbed for nearly fourteen years, when production was completed by Russian television company "First Channel", and aired in November 2006.In his career that spanned over five decades, Sergei Bondarchuk had credits as actor, director, writer, and co-producer in a wide range of films. He suffered a heart attack and died on October 20, 1994, and was laid to rest in Novodevichy Cemetery in Moscow, Russia, next to such Russian luminaries as Anton Chekhov (he admired Chekhov and read his works voraciously) and Mikhail A. Bulgakov among others. His death caused a considerable mourning in Russia. Bondarchuk was survived by his second wife, actress Irina Skobtseva and their children, actress Alyona Bondarchuk, and actor/director Fyodor Bondarchuk, and actress Natalya Bondarchuk, his daughter with his first wife, actress Inna Makarova.As a tribute to Sergei Bondarchuk, his son, Fyodor Bondarchuk called him "a father and my teacher," and dedicated his directorial debut, 9 rota (2005), set in war-torn Afghanistan, whereas Sergei's directorial debut was set in WW2.