Ilya Averbakh - Soviet film director, screenwriter and cameraman. His personality concentrated all the typical features of the Leningrad intellectual: human and creative honesty, moral stoicism, a reverent and altruistic attitude to his profession. He belonged to those people for whom truth and truth were worth more than any material values.
Biography of Ilya Averbakh
Averbakh Ilya Alexandrovich was born in Leningrad in 1934. His parents came from nobles. Mother - Ksenia Kurakina - actress, father - Alexander Averbakh - economist. Both revolved in intellectual circles, theatrical, musical, literary ties were maintained by them throughout their lives. Ilya grew up in an artistic atmosphere, the desire for beauty was instilled in him from an early age.
Despite obvious creative inclinations, by the will of his father, Ilya Alexandrovich entered the First Leningrad Medical Institute. The teaching was given to him quite easily thanks to his excellent memory and a tenacious mind, but more and more he felt that medicine was not in his sphere of interests. Comparisons with Chekhov and Bulgakov, who were also doctors by training, did not help for long.
After graduation, in 1958, Averbach was sent for distribution to the village of Sheksna. Here he drank a full cup of unsettled rural life: a room with six beds, one bedside table, one chair, amenities in the yard and water from the well.
Search for yourself
Having worked the required three years, Averbach decided to completely withdraw from medicine. The difficult years began, during which he tried to write poetry, short stories, and scripts for television programs. His wife, Abe Norkute, recalled that during this period Averbach often had bouts of despondency and despair. It turned out badly to support a family, besides Sheksna did not dispose to optimism. Finally, one of my friends said that the Higher Screenwriting Courses were opening in Moscow. There was only one point in the requirements for applicants - the availability of published works. In a short time, Ilya Averbakh published several reports and one article. In 1964, he entered these courses in the workshop of E. Gabrilovich.
First steps to the cinema
Almost immediately after graduating from the Higher Courses for Scriptwriters at the USSR State Cinema, in 1967, the film “Personal Life of Valentin Kuzyaev” was released. It consisted of three short stories, two of which - “Out” and “Dad” - were shot by Ilya Averbakh. The film tells about high school student Valentin Kuzyaev, nicknamed Kuzya, who was invited to take part in the program "What I want to become." Vigilant criticism sharply negatively assessed the film, seeing in it slander against Soviet youth, the main character was branded as a caricature of a modern young man, and the director was accused of trying to denigrate reality.
Success
The first feature film was shot by Averbach in his own script. "Risk degree" is the work of a completely mature master, confidently managing the material. The cast is also magnificent: B. Livanov as the main character of the surgeon Sedov, I. Smoktunovsky as the mathematician Kirillov, his patient. The drama of the storyline is based on the confrontation of these two completely different people - a philosopher and a cynic. Sedov, endowed with unlimited power over people thanks to his profession, is forced to make vital decisions every day and has no right to make a mistake. He is focused and not prone to unnecessary philosophizing. Kirillov, seriously ill and aware of this, does not trust medicine, asks tricky questions and questions the possibilities of doctors.
This time, criticism favorably received the film, noting the incredible skill that Ilya Averbakh demonstrated. The director, however, was dissatisfied with the result. He later said that in the film, medicine turned out, but philosophy did not. Nevertheless, the “Risk Level” received in 1969 the Grand Prize for the feature films section at the International Film Festival dedicated to the activities of the Red Cross.
“Monologue” and “Fantasy Faryatyev” (Ilya Averbakh): films that make you think
There are only seven feature films in the filmography of Averbach, which is probably why each of them left an indelible mark on the audience. One of them is “Monologue” according to the script of E. Gabrilovich, which was released in 1972. The plot focuses on the relationship between the famous scientist and academician Nicodemus Sretensky and his daughter. Having left the post of director of the institute, he is confronted with his homework face to face. It turns out that, despite mutual love, they cannot bear some features in each other. Intolerance gives rise to numerous conflicts leading to alienation. Marina Neyolova, Stanislav Lyubshin, Margarita Terekhova, Mikhail Gluzsky played in this film. In 1973, the film participated in the Kansk Festival, received an honorary diploma of the International Film Festival in Georgetown.
“Fantasy Faryatyev” is, of course, the best film by Ilya Averbakh. One of the reviews on this picture is called "Hear someone else's pain." This name is the quintessence of not only the meaning of the film, but also of the entire work of Averbach. Alexandra, or Shura (Marina Neyolova), is a music teacher, lives with her mother and cannot find a common language with her. Here again, the theme of the impossibility of mutual understanding between close people sounds. Shura is hopelessly in love with Bedhudov's scoundrel, who cannot make her happiness in any way, because he himself is not capable of deep feelings. When Faryatyev, a dreamer, idealist, appears in the Shura family, talking about some nonexistent things for granted, a certain turning point is planned in the life of the main characters. A new world is being opened for them, they get an opportunity to look where harmony and love are the determining quantities. The role of Faryatyev was played by Andrei Mironov. It is unexpected to see a merry fellow and a joker, with whom a song about a butterfly is associated, in the form of an ugly, shy dreamer. However, the actor coped with such a dramatic and complex role.
Foreign Letters (1979)
This film is associated with the movie "Let's Live Until Monday." Here we are talking about the relationship of a young teacher and her student. Vera Ivanovna (I. Kupchenko) believes that she should take an active part in the moral education of Zina Begunkova (S. Smirnova). However, reality shows that her students are real barbarians, for whom other people's feelings are only a cause for laughter. This turns out to be a shock for the teacher, who sees the meaning of her work as cherishing the best in an immature mind. She realizes with horror that she no longer loves her wards. Foreign Letters is a great chamber drama with great cast and intense action.
Illness and death
In 1985, Averbach went to hospital. He had an operation on the bladder, as all his friends thought. At first he was vigorous, joked, was interested in chess matches. However, after the first operation, he completely fenced off all friends and acquaintances. None of them could break through to him. It soon became clear that another operation had taken place. For two months Ilya Averbakh struggled with the disease. The cause of death, most likely, was that the director’s exhausted body could not cope with the onset of the disease. He died in his native Leningrad on January 11, 1986.
Averbach was twice married. The first wife is Eiba Norkuta (specialist in stage iconography), from whom he has a daughter, Maria, and the second is Natalia Ryazantseva, screenwriter. In the second marriage, the director did not have children.
Ilya Averbakh made films about the personal dramas of people. In his work there is no place for general phrases, noisy slogans and sore trivial truths. His characters are persistently trying to find a common language with this world, which often turns out to be deaf to their feelings. In his paintings, a voice empathizing with these dramas sounds, they make up the golden fund of not only Russian, but also world cinema.