Soviet director Konstantin Voinov: biography, filmography

Voinov Konstantin is a Soviet filmmaker who immortalized his name by shooting the comedy “The Marriage of Balzaminov”, which is still popular today. In addition to this picture, the director left a legacy in the form of 10 multi-genre films and several acting works. Which of Voinov’s works deserves special attention?

short biography

Konstantin Naumovich Katz, that’s how the director’s real name sounds, was born in 1918 at the height of the Civil War.

Back in the late 30s, while working in Moscow theaters as an actor, Konstantin Naumovich changed his original name to a “harmonious” pseudonym. There is an opinion that the attitude towards Jews in the USSR was ambiguous, therefore it was easier to work and live without advertising such an origin. For the same reason, their real Jewish surnames were hidden by actress Faina Ranevskaya, a little later - actors Andrei Mironov and Semyon Farada.

In 1946, Voinov took up the post of director at the Moscow Theater. Moscow City Council. In 1957, Konstantin Naumovich became one of the permanent directors of the Mosfilm film studio. It was then that his first film works began to be shown on large screens.

Konstantin Voinov: films. Early work

Voinov was credited to the staff of Mosfilm thanks to the successful short film Two Lives. The script for the debut work Konstantin wrote independently based on the story of Pavel Nilin "The Bug".

In 1958, the director presents the black-and-white drama noir "Three came out of the woods." The film tells about the investigation of the war crime of the Great Patriotic War. Employees of the NKVD receive information that one of the partisan detachments was destroyed by German punishers on a tip from one of "their own". The main characters have to find out who betrayed their compatriots.

Konstantin Voinov is a director who was forced to work in a certain ideological direction. But this did not stop his films from remaining humane and winning international awards. For example, the 1959 military drama “The Sun Shines All” won an honorary diploma at the Scottish Film Festival.

The plot of the film is dedicated to the fate of Lieutenant Savelyev, who in 1945, due to the cowardice of his comrade, was seriously wounded in the war and lost his sight. Having returned home, Savelyev is trying to establish his former life, but his relationship with his wife is not glued, and the very man through whose fault he became blind becomes the head of Nikolai at work. The main character had the courage to go through a fierce war and stay alive, he finds the strength to cope with difficulties in the postwar period.

“The marriage of Balzaminov”

At the beginning of his career, Konstantin Voinov mainly directed dramas, but became famous throughout the Soviet Union for a film of a completely different genre. In 1964, the director directed the tragicomedy “The Marriage of Balzaminov” with Georgi Vitsin in the title role. The script of the painting was based on 3 popular plays by A.N. Ostrovsky.

Nonna Mordyukova (“The Diamond Arm”), Lyudmila Gurchenko (“Station for Two”), Ekaterina Savinova (“Come Tomorrow ...”), Nadezhda Rumyantseva (“Girls”) and many other stars of Russian cinema also appeared in the tape. “Marriage of Balzaminov” was a huge success with the viewer. It was this film that made the director famous even in our time.

"Uncle's dream"

After the premiere of “The Marriage of Balzaminov,” Voinov Konstantin continued to develop the theme of the film adaptations and revised the text of Dostoevsky’s novel “Uncle's Dream” to the screenplay of the same name. The film was released in 1967.

This time, the cast consisted of representatives of the "old guard". Sergei Martinson, who began acting in films in 1924, received the role of the old rich prince “K”. Lidia Smirnova, famous in the 40s. thanks to the heroic images of partisans and radio operators, she appeared in the image of a provincial lady who is obsessed with the idea of ​​giving her daughter in marriage.

The film "Uncle's Dream" in our days is not as popular as "The Marriage of Balzaminov." However, it is part of the collection of the golden heritage of Soviet cinema.

Other films of the director

Voinov Konstantin in 1970 presented the audience the drama "Wonderful character" according to the script of writer Edward Radzinsky. The main role in the film was played by the notorious Tatyana Doronina, now the director of the Moscow Art Theater. M. Gorky.

After 3 years, the world was seen by the comedy “Dacha” with Lidia Smirnova and Evgeny Evstigneev, followed by the film adaptation of the work of I. Turgenev “Rudin”. The last 2 films of the director - “Loan for marriage” and “Hat” - are practically unknown to the modern viewer.