Vladimir Bortko

Vladimir Vladimirovich Bortko (; born 7 May 1946) is a Russian film director, screenwriter, producer and politician. He was a member of the State Duma between 2011 and 2021, and was awarded the title of People's Artist of Russia.

Biography Bortko was born 7 May 1946 in Moscow. In 1969 he went to the Karpenko-Kary State University of Theatre, Film and Television in Kyiv. In 1980, Vladimir Bortko became production leader in the Kinostudiya Lenfilm in Leningrad.

In 1991 he made Afghan Breakdown, a Soviet-Italian film about the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan with Michele Placido in the lead, critical of the Soviet military activity. During the troubled shooting that started in Tajikistan in 1990 one of the team members, Nikita Matrosov, was killed by Tajik ultra-nationalists following the 1990 Dushanbe riots. According to Bortko, most of their equipment was destroyed as well, the team was evacuated, and the shooting was finished in Crimea and Syria.

After the turn of the century Vladimir Bortko realized two of the biggest projects in the history of Russian cinema for the television channel Telekanal Rossiya. The first was an adaptation of the novel The Idiot written by the Russian author Fyodor Dostoevsky into a television series of 10 episodes in 2002. The series clinched all the major television prizes in Russia, and actor Yevgeny Mironov received the award for Best Actor at the Monte Carlo Television Festival.

Three years later followed an adaptation of the novel The Master and Margarita written by Mikhail Bulgakov, also into a TV series of 10 episodes. The first broadcast of 19 December 2005 was preceded by months of controversy in the media.

In 2009, Bortko caused another big controversy, with his film adaptation of the historical novel Taras Bulba written by the Russian author Nikolai Gogol. This time the criticism came from Ukraine, because while Bortko allowed the Polish actors in the film to speak Polish, the Ukrainian Cossacks had to express themselves in poor Russian.

Bortko is a member of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF).

In March 2014 he signed a letter in support of the position of the President of Russia Vladimir Putin on Russian annexation of Crimea.

In 2022, during the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Bortko cried live on TV as a result of the sinking of the Russian cruiser Moskva in the Black Sea, saying that this was "a real casus belli for the war against Ukraine".

Major projects

Film and television

1974 – Doctor (thesis short film) 1975 – Channel 1980 – My Father Is an Idealist 1984 – Without Family 1984 – The Blonde Around the Corner 1987 – Once Lied 1988 – Heart of a Dog 1991 – Afghan Breakdown 1998 – The Circus Burned Down, and the Clowns Have Gone 2000 – Gangsters of Saint Petersburg (TV series) 2002 – The Idiot (TV series) 2005 – The Master and Margarita (TV series) 2009 – Taras Bulba 2011 – Peter the Great: The Testament

Theatre

1993 – Oedipus Rex 2010 – Malleus Maleficarum