ТИХИЙ ДОН. Как он был казак, так казаком и останется

The film is dedicated to one of the most ambitious and accomplished Soviet films by director Sergei Gerasimov, "And Quiet Flows the Don." Much was shown in this film for the first time: such massive battle scenes had never been filmed in our cinema before. The loss of the patriarchal pre-revolutionary Cossack way of life is shown for the first time as a tragedy. For the first time, the protagonist is unable to decide on his quest, and then realizes that he must side with neither the Whites nor the Reds. Experts for whom Sergei Gerasimov's name is of great significance participate in the film: VGIK professor Mariana Rostotskaya, cinematographer Igor Klebanov, film critic Leonid Pavlyuchik, and Zinaida Kiriyenko, who plays one of the leading roles. For them, this film is an important part of their biography. They have much to say about Gerasimov and the era in which it was made. Sergei Gerasimov first attempted to direct "And Quiet Flows the Don" before the Great Patriotic War. He was rejected. The Soviet film industry's leadership was dissatisfied with the main character, who seemed undecided, neither for the Reds nor the Whites, and whose fate was too convoluted. As was his personal life. In 1955, on the eve of his fiftieth birthday, Sergei Gerasimov again proposed adapting "Quiet Flows the Don." This time, he received approval. He was insistently asked to collaborate with the author. And so it went. First, Sholokhov approved the script, then the leading actors. And then he accepted the finished film. Filming lasted a year and eight months. Eighty major roles and no fewer than four hundred extras were cast. The entire production, from initial production to its first screening, took two and a half years. Sholokhov later profusely thanked Gerasimov and the film crew for so masterfully compressing his literary epic, which had taken him 15 years to create, into just over five hours of screen time.