Honored Artist of the Russian Federation, Soviet and Russian film director, producer Viktor Anatolyevich Sergeyev was a wise man, a competent specialist and an absolute optimist regarding the development of domestic cinema.
Gaining experience
Victor Sergeyev was born in Leningrad on April 3, 1938. He graduated from the Faculty of Journalism of Leningrad University, but, following his dream, did not work in his specialty, but continued his education at the directing department of the Leningrad Institute of Culture named after Krupskaya.
In the period from 1960 to 1964 he worked as an assistant, and then as an assistant director at the Belarusfilm film studio. In 1966, he tried himself as a screenwriter. From his pen came the script for the documentary film "Pot", which after the end of production was banned for showing. In 1982, he was directly involved in the creation of the television movie Life of Berlioz, co-authored by Viktor Sergeyev was Jacques Trebuta.
The first author's project
For a fairly long period of time, Sergeyev worked for many famous directors: D. Asanova, A. Batalov, I. Maslennikov as a second director. It so happened that Viktor Sergeev created his first independent film on the eve of his 50th birthday. His full-length television movie Treasure was released in 1988. Many stars of Russian cinema took part in the creation of the picture: Lev Durov, Dmitry Kharatyan, Lidia Fedoseeva-Shukshina, Sergey Parshin.
In the 90s, director Victor Sergeyev became known as a master of genre cinema. In 1990, the film “The Executioner” was released. According to the director, he created a very tough and cruel project, which tends to be positioned as a psychological drama. Given the trends of the time, the emergence of criminals at that time in Russia such a picture took place. A year later, he removes the tape "Genius" with Alexander Abdulov and Innokenty Smoktunovsky. The film, completely unexpectedly for the creators, became an iconic, cult picture.
Among other notable works of the director: “Strange Men of Semenova Ekaterina”, “Sin. A story of passion. ” In 1997, he acts as a director in the political action movie Schizophrenia, where A. Abdulov is again the lead actor. In the picture, Victor Sergeyev is trying to investigate the election system that prevailed in 1996.
Overcoming all the steps of the career ladder
1997 was a significant stage in the development of Viktor Anatolyevich’s creative career - he was appointed director of the Lenfilm film studio. According to the statement of Sergeyev himself, he went through all stages from an assistant director to the director of a film studio, each of them gave him experience in organizational, administrative and creative work, which was useful in life. He left high office voluntarily in 2002 to devote himself completely to directing.
The director shot not only full-length films. Victor Sergeyev directed two episodes of “Deadly Force”, which were awarded the TEFI Prize, eight episodes of “The Collapse of the Antibiotic” (“Gangster Petersburg”). With his participation, such tapes appeared as “American” by D. Meskhiev, “Taurus” and “Moloch” by A. Sokurov. For the production of these projects, Viktor Anatolyevich received the Nika-2001 award in the nomination “Producer of the Year”.
Personal life
Victor Sergeev was twice married. The first time his wife was Alevtina Ivanovna, the mother of the famous cultural figure Nikita Mikhailovsky. Nikita for a long time considered Victor his own father, even his first creative experience he received thanks to the efforts of his stepfather. Victor Anatolyevich helped Nikita break into the cinema.
After the death of his first wife, Sergeyev married a second time later. His chosen one was the costume designer of Lenfilm, Irina Kaverzina.
Victor Sergeyev died in 2006 from leukemia in Moscow, leaving a rich creative legacy to grateful descendants.