Innokentiy Smotkunovkiy (born 28 March 1925 – 3 August 1994) was a Soviet film and stage actor. Served during World War II. An acclaimed performer, his portrayal of Hamlet in a 1964 film won him praise overseas, including a BAFTA nomination. One of Smotkunovkiy's best known roles among wider audiences was in a popular Soviet crime comedy Beware of the Car, a satire where he portrayed a thief who stole cars from criminals to donate the money from car sales to orphanages. Other notable roles include dramatizations of Dostoyevsky's The Idiot in Bolshoi Drama Theater (1957) and Tolstoy's Tsar Fyodor Ioannovich in Maly Theatre (1973). Awarded the title of People's Artist of the USSR in 1974.
How far can a man overcome by a destructive passion go? And does he realize that slavish worship of irrepressible desires always entails retribution?...
Three naval cadets accidentally get possession of a secret diary that was stolen from Bestuzhev, a vice-chancellor of Russia. If this diary ever gets abroad, the consequences for the country would be grave. The cadets are trying to return the papers to their owner, but there are others who want to get the papers......
Detective television series based on the works of Arthur Conan Doyle. Five films about Sherlock Holmes, shot by Igor Maslennikov earlier, were remounted in 2000, a connecting story about Conan Doyle's literary secretary, Mr. Wood, who is preparing an anniversary collection of stories about Holmes for the beginning of the coming XX century. Sir Arthur receives huge mail every day, addressed not to him, but to Sherlock Holmes. And then one day a letter arrives with a plea for help, and Doyle begin...
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson is a series of five films produced by Lenfilm for the Soviet Central Television, split into eleven episodes, starring Vasily Livanov as Sherlock Holmes and Vitaly Solomin as Dr. Watson. They were directed by Igor Maslennikov and filmed in Russia (the then Soviet Union) between 1979 and 1986, and the series was one of the most successful in the history of Russian television....
Pavel Ivanovich Chichikov plans to buy the titles to “dead souls” and use them as collateral to obtain a large loan. He comes to a small provincial town and begins to proposition the local landowners. These landowners are revealed to be so petty and avaricious that not even Chichikov’s amazing offer can be worked to his advantage on them. Some stall, some refuse for no obvious reasons, some promise and then renege, and others want “in on the deal.” In the end, Chichikov, having concluded that th...
The fifth and final part of the cycle of Soviet television feature films, filmed by director Igor Maslennikov based on the stories of the English writer Arthur Conan Doyle about the famous detective Sherlock Holmes. In the first part based on the works - "The Adventure of the Engineer's Thumb", "The Adventure of the Second Stain". In the second part based on the works - "The Adventure of the Bruce-Partington Plans", and "His Last Bow"....
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A film about reflection, where the hero argues with himself....
Interstellar expedition equipped by "pioneers"(soviet scouts) reached Alpha Kassiopea and found that smart robots took control on hole planet. Their only goal - to make happy , as they understand, their masters. Happines was, actually, sutisfactions of primitive needs, and removing "disturbing" emotions like love, responsebility etc. A many years ago they succeded to reach this goal and all aborigines died out. A very little amount of people escaped from "total happening" and their descendants o...
Start of interstellar expedition equipped by "pioneers"(soviet scouts)....
Directed by Edvin Laine and Viktor Tregubovich, Trust (1976) is a Finnish-Soviet historical drama film that follows the relations between Finland and the Soviet Union. In December 1917, the Finnish delegation, composed of Chairman of the Senate Finance Department P.E. Svinhufvud (Vilho Siivola), Senator Carl Enckell (Yrjö Tähtelä) and State Secretary Gustaf Idman (Yrjö Paulo) arrive in St. Petersburg to meet V.I. Lenin (Kirill Lavrov) to gain recognition for the country's independence....
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Follows the famous Oryol trotter, multiple champion of the beginning of the century. Then - in sharp battles on the tracks of hippodromes - the fate of domestic horse breeding was decided. The world of animals and people is shown through the perception of a horse named Big Boy....
Ukraine, 1918. Underground worker Sigismund Raevsky organizes a Komsomol cell and gathers young people to fight against the German invaders......
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Aboard a ship early in the 20th-century, a middle-aged Italian tells his story of love to a Russian....
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An insurance agent who moonlights as a carthief steals cars various crooks and never from the common people. He sells the stolen cars and gives the money to charity. His best friend, a cop, is assigned to bring in this modern robin hood....
Set in Russia during the Battle of Stalingrad in the Second World War. The war is shown through the eyes of simple soldiers, who are dreaming about love and being loved in a peaceful life, which most of them will never have....
This is a life story of three girlfriends from youth to autumn ages. Their dreams and wishes, love, disillusions......
Raskolnikov, an impoverished ex-law student, kills an old pawnbroker and her sister, perhaps for money, perhaps to prove a theory about being above the law. He comes to police attention through normal procedures (he was the victim's client), but his outbursts make him the prime suspect of the clever Porfiry. Meanwhile, life swirls around Raskolnikov: his mother and sister come to the city followed by two older men seeking his sister's hand; he meets a drunken clerk who is then killed in a traffi...
Shakespeare's 17th century masterpiece about the "Melancholy Dane" was given one of its best screen treatments by Soviet director Grigori Kozintsev. Kozintsev's Elsinore was a real castle in Estonia, utilized metaphorically as the "stone prison" of the mind wherein Hamlet must confine himself in order to avenge his father's death. Hamlet himself is portrayed (by Innokenti Smoktunovsky) as the sole sensitive intellectual in a world made up of debauchers and revellers. Several of Kozintsev directo...
A story about tragic events in France during the German occupation in WWII....
The story concerns the events in Saint Petersburg on the eve of the First World War. Private detective Petya Chukhontsev, a law student who has not completed his studies, investigates the case of the murdered inventor Kuklin. He was murdered exactly as he predicted during a New Year's visit to Chukhontsev. While investigating the Kuklin case, Petya soon realizes that the central figure in this case is the German Scholz, the owner, who cheaply buys up the inventions of Russian craftsmen and hands...
The young girl Olga Vasilyeva grew up in an orphanage. She never knew her mother and wants to find her. The only trace she has is a preserved letter from her mother from her personal file, which she managed to get from the administration of the orphanage. For a short vacation at her factory school, she travels from Sverdlovsk to Moscow following the unreliable traces of this letter. Yelena Alekseyevna — the woman she finds when she arrives at the address turns out to be a teacher in a ballet sc...
Hermann is an officer of the engineers in the Imperial Russian Army. He constantly watches the other officers gamble, but never plays himself. One night, Tomsky tells a story about his grandmother, an elderly countess. Many years ago, in France, she lost a fortune at cards, and then won it back with the secret of the three winning cards, which she learned from the notorious Count of St. Germain. Hermann becomes obsessed with obtaining the secret....
A drama based on the daily life of a hospital and its doctors....
Based on the play of the same name by Leo Tolstoy. According to Fyodor Protasov, the surrounding life is riddled with dirt and falsehood. He does not want to participate "in all this dirty trick", he does not have the courage to fight it, and he chooses the third way — to stage suicide....
In July 1942, in the Second World War, the rearguard of the Russian army protects the bridgehead of the Don River against the German army while the retreating Russian troops cross the bridge. While they move back to the Russian territory through the countryside, the soldiers show their companionship, sentiments, fears and heroism to defend their motherland....
A story about a good doctor - surgeon Mishkin who works in a countryside hospital....
Daniel Corban reports his wife Elizabeth missing to the police. A priest arrives and says he has found her. When he brings her in, Corban insists she is not his wife. When several other people arrive and verify she is Elizabeth, Daniel feels he is losing his grip on reality....
The film is dedicated to the great Russian composer Pyotr Tchaikovsky (1840-1893). It tells of the last twenty years of the great master’s life, of his friendship with Baroness von Meck, an outstanding woman of her time, who for many years was Tchaikovsky’s guardian angel. The film also includes retrospections of the composer’s childhood and adolescent years, with Tchaikovsky’s life poetically recounted against the background of fragments from his operas and ballets performed by the best Russian...
About Russian space program and missile industry, and it's founder Sergei P. Korolev, from the 1920s to the first man in space in 1961....
He is overly intelligent... He is genius... And he's just trying to make his life a little bit better in an new era post-communist Russia....
Two young scientists are exploring new fields of nuclear physics. Dmitry Gusev and Ilya Kulikov are good friends, but rivals in love. Dmitry marries Lyolya and they live happily together. Luck has it that he makes an important discovery. Unfortunately he exposes himself to radioactivity during the experiments. As a result he falls seriously ill. However Dmitry has a strong spirit. His will to live, the deep passion for his work and his strong love for mankind makes it possible for him to recover...
Based on Anna Ahmatova's translation of Korean poem about eternal love....
Admetus, king of Feres, makes an agreement with the Fates to postpone the date of his death, in exchange for someone else taking his place, without knowing that the chosen one will be his beloved wife Alcestis. Desperate, Admetus asks Hercules for help in rescuing Alcestis from death... An animated short film based on the Greek myth of Admetus and Alcestis....
A feature film based on the three-part adaptation of the poetic and dramatic cycle of Alexander Pushkin...
When gold is discovered in a remote location, a variety of different groups descend on the spot to stake their claims, resulting in a spate of brutal violence....
Sergei and Tanya are in love with each other. Sergei is drafted into the marine corps and Tania waits for his return. Sergei's division is abandoned in favor of helping local residents in distress. During the operation, his armored personnel gets carried into the sea. His relatives receive a notice of his death. Tanya's loving childhood friend, a hockey player, helps her to cope with misfortune and she marries him. But it turned out that Sergei did not perish. He, together with a wounded friend...
Journey into "Hamlet"-the play and the man-through the experiences of some of the major actors and directors who have brought Shakespeare's great tragedy to life. Christopher Plummer, David Tennant, John Nettles, John Simm, Sir Trevor Nunn, Franco Zeffirelli, Philip Saville, and others explore the enduring appeal of the Prince of Denmark more than 400 years after his stage debut....
Based on the classic novella, "Le petit prince", by Antoine de Saint-Exupery....
On the eve of his wedding, a young doctor leaves Moscow to see his mother who lives in a nature reserve. Things are complicated by the fact that the doctor's ex-girlfriend is also there, and she is expecting a child....
Historical drama about the engineer of the first printing press built in Muscovite Rus' and his complicated relationship with the state under the rule of tsar Ivan IV ("the Terrible"). Released for theaters as a 2-part 147 minute movie and for TV as a 5-part 5-hour miniseries....
Three naval cadets accidentally get possession of a secret diary that was stolen from Bestuzhev, a vice-chancellor of Russia. If this diary ever gets abroad, the consequences for the country would be grave. The cadets are trying to return the papers to their owner, but there are others who want to get the papers......
A musical fairytale based on the poem "The Tale of the Dead Princess" by Alexander Pushkin....
In this picture, the barrier epitomizes the line between reality and dreams, the pattern of harmony and happiness. The delicate, pretty, sensitive Dorotea and the sedate middle-aged composer Antoni meet by chance. He gives her shelter in his house. Famous composer falls under the spell of young Dorothea: A pretty, thin-skinned, though quite an eccentric girl....
A play about the life and death of Jean-Baptiste Molière, an artist tired of fighting the world....
In one of the realms, there was time for the prince to get married, but the bride would have to be a real princess. A sign was put up on the gates: “ A Princess Wanted”. But in response to it there appeared only a small girl, wet to the bones after the rain and bearing no resemblance to nobility. So the prince was obliged to venture off to other lands in search of a suitable match. Henceforth the prince’s adventures unfold. In one kingdom, he met a fat king, in another – a hospitable king. He al...
A tragic accident happens during the shooting of a movie about Jesus Christ. An actor who plays Jesus is killed. The director of the movie believes that he is guilty of this death....
Soviet adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson's The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde....
One soviet programmer has problems in his job. He is laughed at by women, they think he is too awkward. His chiefs are giving no rest to him. In addition to that they give him very difficult project to be done very soon. Overcoming himself he does impossible. After closing away in his office and spending there several days and nights without sleep he finds some solution and immediately fells asleep. After waking up after very surrealistic dream he surprises of what has happened while he was asle...
The main characters of this edition of the popular television almanac are the heroes of the fantastic stories of the Soviet writer O. Lukyanov “The Uncertainty Principle” and the American writer A. Porges “Valuable Commodity”. During a meeting with the inhabitants of other planets, earthlings encounter amazing phenomena......
Researching for a script about a famous scientist who tragically passed away, a writer meets his wife Anna who's been struggling with the loss. A tale of the couple's life and love unfolds....
A film about the Northern Urals and its nature, as well as about the life of a local forester and his family....
Film version of the Rimsky Korsakov opera from the Pushkin story. Motsart i Salyeri (Mozart and Salieri), based on a legend that Salieri poisoned Mozart, meditates on the nature of creativity while introducing, in brilliantly compressed speeches, what was to be one of the important Russian themes—metaphysical rebellion against God....
Theft takes place in Washington, DC. Howard Knox is a well-intentioned Congressman crusading for reform. He is scheduled to make a speech in which he will expose the corrupt activities of an industrial magnate and his congressional stooges. The wealthy capitalist in question, Anthony Starkweather, along with his son-in-law and political puppet, Senator Thomas Chalmers, will do everything in their power to foil Knox's great speech and publicly disgrace him. To complicate matters, Margaret Chalmer...
Pavel Ivanovich Chichikov plans to buy the titles to “dead souls” and use them as collateral to obtain a large loan. He comes to a small provincial town and begins to proposition the local landowners. These landowners are revealed to be so petty and avaricious that not even Chichikov’s amazing offer can be worked to his advantage on them. Some stall, some refuse for no obvious reasons, some promise and then renege, and others want “in on the deal.” In the end, Chichikov, having concluded that th...
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In the fall of 1938, three former fighters of the international brigade — russian Shukhov, frenchman Henri and american Liz — fall into a resort town on the border of Spain and France. Having met a nurse who is supposed to send Spanish children to Corsica, they decide to help her. However, a fascist rebellion suddenly breaks out in the city, and the children are held hostage to criminals....
Serebryakov, a retired professor and his beautiful, much younger second wife, Yeléna, visit their country estate, which funds their urban lifestyle. Vanya, brother of the Professor's first wife, who manages the farm estate, and the local Doctor Astrov, both fall under Yelena's spell, while complaining of the endless ennui of their provincial existence. Astrov is an experienced physician who performs his job conscientiously, but has lost all idealism and spends much of his time drinking. Sofya, t...
A story of the creation of the atomic bomb in America, Germany and the USSR....
The last twenty-four hours in the lives of a Jewish tailor and his family just prior to their deportation and execution at Babi Yar....
The film takes place in pre-Christian Russia, when Ratibor united the East Slavs into one army against the nomadic Khazars....
A factory worker leads a double life. In that other reality, he's a "killer" doing his dirty work. Receiving the order, he is as close to his "client", penetrating into his life before it is cut off. In parallel, it turns out that the "client" holds in the hands of three respectable women who are connected with each other by one craft - prostitution. Trying to cash in on their secret "killer" gets a feminine charms and falls victim to his greed...
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An older couple have four children who left them long ago. Tired of waiting for letters which never arrive, the father takes a trip to see how the children are doing....
A young philologist works in his teacher's archive, and he manages to decipher Pushkin's priceless autograph. The discoverer, inspired by success, forgets about everything in the world. And the incredible happens: under mysterious circumstances, the archive disappears. Now the scientist needs to defend his good name - and not only among colleagues....
According to the play of the same name of A. N. Ostrovsky. The merchants already possess the big equities. Money "runs the show". The world of feelings and hearts is degraded....
A boy in Russia, circa 1900, makes a daunting trip from his home village to a school in the city....
On the streets of the regional city, a cheerful holiday bustle reigns. The apartment of the Kupriyanovs is also noisy — friends of their youngest daughter Yulka are preparing for the New Year. The old driver Leonid Kupriyanov will not have to celebrate the holiday with his family, he should go on the next trip. Preparing for the New Year, none of the heroes imagined what dramatic events would fall on them, how difficult and unexpectedly the destinies of three families would intertwine, how diffi...
Juggler Dan is beautiful and carefree and not too eager to become the circus main star. However, the meeting with Olga, who has no doubts about his talent, makes Dan think about a creation of anew circus show....
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The puppy learns from animals and birds why you need to bite....
A rich caliph is leading a careless life. One day an evil wizard sells him a magic potion that can turn human into any animal he wants. The only condition: one mustn't laugh....
According to the play of the same name A. N. Ostrovsky. About fidelity and cunning, about purity of human feelings and belief in true happiness…...
About the death of Aleksandr Pushkin, the leading poet and writer of Russia, who was shot on a duel and died when he was 37....
The engineer and the reporter arrived at one of the plants of the Altai. They have just completed the institutions and are confident that the future is in their hands. At the plant, all relations are formed around the dubious glory of the Turner Milovidov. A fresh look, self-confidence and each other help friends to expose the "record holder"....
Based on the play of the same name by A.P. Chekhov....
“Without the Sun” is the first name that Gorky himself gave to his play and which most closely matches its essence. For this work is not about the "day" and its people, but about the indestructible, passionate desire of people from darkness to light, to the sun. "...
Venice, eighteenth century. The young Rosanna, widowed on her wedding day, discovers that she is the sole heir to an enormous patrimony, becoming in this way the most coveted party of the Serenissima....
Knowing that he will soon pass on, elderly Valentin Grack hires private detective Stanislav to follow him around for an entire day and write down everything that he does. It is a cold day and during Grack's travels he encounters a younger woman who addresses him as professor. He then meets a prostitute who turns out to be his daughter, and finally he meets an old woman, his worried wife who has been searching eight days for him. In between meeting the women, Grack finds himself in some almost su...
Drama based on the play of the same name by Maxim Gorky....
The young artist Burtsev goes to Paris about the inheritance left to him by his uncle, who left for France with the first wave of emigrants. There, he is expected by the hostility of some persons interested in the inheritance, and the open sympathies of others - the old man Yerikhonov and his daughter Asya, who fell in love with Burtsev....
Central Russia. The deputy chairman of the district executive committee, Tretyakova, was instructed to organize work to eliminate the consequences of a tornado that suddenly hit the village. She has to come to terms with the indifference of summer residents from a neighboring village, untouched by the disaster. Relying on her own experience and the will of the victims, Tretyakova will do her best......
The film is a recollection of an adult about the unforgettable days of the first post-war year. Klava, who lost her husband at the front, with her 12-year-old daughter Lyusya sheltered Aygul with a seven-year-old boy in her house. Aygul's son - the main character, now became a pilot, recalls his childhood in a small Kazakh city, which fell on a difficult post-war time. Flying high above the Earth, he thinks of the Russian girl Lyusya, from his distant past....
History teacher Nikolay Echevin on his sixtieth birthday receives an anonymous letter in which he is called the "center of public infection" and threatened with murder....
Based on the novel by Charles de Coster "The Legend of Thyl Ulenspiegel and Lamme Goedzak, and their Adventures Heroical, Joyous and Glorious in the Land of Flanders and Elsewhere." First part: "The Ashes of Claes". XVI century. The freedom-loving and cheerful people of the Netherlands under the rule of the Spanish king: persecution, torture, bonfires of the Inquisition, encouraging scammers. The fearless Thyl Uhlenshpiegel and his faithful girlfriend Nele have to go through many trials. Seco...
For Vera — a student of the Leningrad Pedagogical Institute, first love instead of joy and happiness brings disappointment — and it was enough to have one first deception, and before a self-confident girl changes, becomes suspicious and closed. She no longer believes in anyone and runs away from people — having left the institute, Vera and her small daughter leave for a remote village where no one knows her. Soon she has a thin and responsive friend — a teacher at a neighboring school, Aleksei...
Four geologists are searching for diamonds in the wilderness of Siberia. After a long and tiresome journey they manage to find their luck and put the diamond mine on the map. The map must be delivered back to Moscow. But on the day of their departure a terrible forest fire wreaks havoc, and the geologists get trapped in the woods....
A dying man in his forties recalls his childhood, his mother, the war and personal moments that tell of and juxtapose pivotal moments in Soviet history with daily life....
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The final film of the television series "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson." It is based on the late and little-known stories of Arthur Conan Doyle, united by the theme of the approaching world war and the struggle of the legendary detective with foreign spies....
In addition to the two-part television version of the film, a shorter version was installed to show the film, entitled “Sherlock Holmes in the 20th Century.” In this installation version, in particular, the entire plot of the story “Bruce-Partington Drawings” was deleted. A film version was released before the premiere of the full (two-part) television version of the film....
The spicy story of a modest Russian guy drawn into the incessant sexual marathon by the will of rival intelligence agencies. The victims of such an incredible love contest are charming ladies - from an opera singer to an overseas prostitute - and even the wife of an intelligence general. However, the love that has happened violates the plans of the rival intelligence agencies....
A film adaptation of A. Sukhovo-Kobylin’s work “The Case,” which reproduces the details of the author’s trial experience....
The second part of a trilogy of films based on Pushkin's drawings, poems and letters....
The film is based on the drawings and manuscripts of A.S.Pushkin....
Soviet full-length animated film based on drawings by Alexander Pushkin directed by Andrey Khrzhanovsky, which includes all three pictures of the Pushkin's trilogy of the director: "I Am Tlying to You as a Memory..." (1977), "With You I Am Again..." (1980) and "Autumn" (1982)....
The social ferment in late 19th century Russia which led to the 1917 Russian Revolution is movingly portrayed in this lengthy historical drama, which is very faithful to the 1907 novel The Mother by the celebrated Marxist writer Maxim Gorky (1868-1936). In the story, "the mother" (Inna Tchourikova) has no other recourse than to watch her decent, kindly husband turn into an animalistic, drunken brute as a result of working in the inhuman conditions of a steel mill in the town of Sormovo. When he ...
A TV movie inspired by Ivan Turgenev's Torrents of Spring....
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The film is about the dramatic events of the early years of the Bolshevik Revolution. Based on the play of the same name by Vladimir Bill-Belotserkovets....
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Animated short about a love between a heron and a crane....
First Love is based on the eponymous novella by Ivan Turgenev set in the first third of the 19th century. It follows a 16-year old boy who becomes infatuated with a next door neighbor....
Dina starts to see ghosts after her father mysteriously disappears......
The film tells about the life of the Soviet country in the 30s of the twentieth century, based on the feuilletons and notebooks of famous writers Ilya Ilf and Eugene Petrov…...
Many centuries ago, on the southwest coast of India, in Travancore, the art of kathakali dance arose, the most important place in which gestures occupy....
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A film about the life and work of the famous film director Mikhail Romm....
Based on the play of the same name by A.P. Chekhov....
In his unpublished main work, The Boards of Fate, Velimir Khlebnikov discovered the Law of Time, according to which, as he believed, world history unfolds. "The Law of Time", as well as other discoveries by Khlebnikov, are presented in the film in a playful way with the participation of young people....
Screen version of William Saroyan's play about a family of Armenian immigrants during the Great Depression....