The century jubilee of the coryphaeus of Soviet cinema
On September 25, 1920, in the village of Belozerka, Kherson province (now Ukraine), in the family of collective farm chairman Fyodor Bondarchuk and his wife Tatyana, a son, Sergey, was born. Soon the Bondarchuk family moved to Taganrog. In 1937, while still a schoolboy, Sergey Bondarchuk entered the stage of the Taganrog Drama Theater. And after graduation the school, he entered the Rostov Theater College, which caused strong discontent with his father. After graduating from college in 1941, he was assigned to the Theater of the Red Army in Grozny. In connection with the outbreak of the Great Patriotic War, in April 1942 he was drafted into the Red Army. In 1944 he was awarded the medal "For the Defense of the Caucasus". In 1985, Sergey Bondarchuk, like all veterans of the Great Patriotic War, was awarded the jubilee Order of the Patriotic War, II degree.
After the end of the war and demobilization from the army, Sergey Bondarchuk returned to acting. More precisely, he entered the VGIK (All-Union State Institute of Cinematography) in the workshop of Sergei Gerasimov and already in 1948 played in two films: a cameo role in the film "Michurin" and, a small, but at least ideologically quite significant, role of Valko in the film adaptation of Alexander Fadeev's novel "Young Guard", carried out by Gerasimov. The image of the underground communist Valko, as you know, did not have a real prototype, unlike most of the other heroes of Fadeev's novel. This image was introduced by the writer in the second edition of the novel, after accusations received from Stalin that the novel did not reflect the leading and guiding role of the party in organizing resistance to the Nazi occupiers.
After this role, Bondarchuk was doomed to play exclusively the role of ideologically reliable and verified characters. As the only deviation, only roles in film adaptations of works of classical literature, such as Chekhov's Dymov or Shakespeare's Othello, were allowed. And Sergei Bondarchuk willingly played these roles, for which he was showered with the favors of the leaders: already in 1951 he was awarded the title of Honored Artist of the RSFSR, and just a year later, in 1952, he was awarded the title of People's Artist of the USSR. The title that many other equally talented actors have achieved for decades. This is about the same as if the captain immediately received the rank of colonel in the army. In addition, in 1952 he was awarded the Stalin Prize of the first degree.
In 1959, Sergei Bondarchuk began directing. And the very first, debut film by Bondarchuk - "The Fate of a Man" - became a masterpiece. In total, Sergei Fedorovich Bondarchuk shot 7 full-length feature films during his life. Of these, three films entered the Golden Thousand. We have already written about all these three film masterpieces - "The Fate of Man", "War and Peace", "They Fought for the Motherland".
The benevolence of the communist authorities to Sergey Bondarchuk, at least before the beginning of perestroika, was manifested not only in the rain of awards, prizes and titles that this, undoubtedly, a talented actor and great director was showered with. It is difficult to name any state award of the highest dignity or an prize that he would not have been awarded. But benevolence manifested itself in other ways, as well. To him, a member of the CPSU who played communists, almost the only art worker in the country, and not just a figure, but the head of the creative union (for 15 years he was the secretary of the Union of Cinematographers), educator of the younger generation (for more than twenty years he was a professor at VGIK), after all, a deputy of the Supreme Soviet of the RSFSR for almost 30 years, was allowed to maintain faith in God almost openly. Moreover, to maintain contacts with the Pope, who even set aside a special cell so that Sergey Bondarchuk, being in Rome, could pray.
The benevolence of the Soviet authorities and the special trust of the security agencies in Sergei Bondarchuk was also manifested in the fact that he was among the few allowed to accept offers from Western filmmakers to film abroad (films "Era notte a Roma (Blackout in Rome)" (1960) by Roberto Rossellini, "Bitka na Neretvi (The Battle of Neretva)" (1969) by Veljko Bulajic) or in joint productions (the Soviet-Italian film "Waterloo", the Soviet-Mexican-Italian film "Red Bells" (1982)).
And what, obviously, a heavy blow was for him the decisions of the V Congress of the Union of Cinematographers of 1986, which left him, in fact, out of the cinematic activity.
Sergey Bondarchuk is included in the list of 100 great directors of world cinema, compiled by FilmGourmand.
