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Sergei Appolinarievich Gerasimov (21 May 1906 – 26 November 1985) was a Soviet film director and screenwriter. The oldest film school in the world, the VGIK, bears his name.
Gerasimov started his film industry career as an actor in 1924. At first he appeared in Kozintsev and Trauberg films, such as The Overcoat and The New Babylon. Later, he was commissioned to produce screen versions of the literary classics of socialist realism. His epic screenings of Alexander Fadeyev's The Young Guard (1948) and Mikhail Sholokhov's And Quiet Flows the Don (1957–58) were extolled by the authorities as exemplary.
During several decades of their teaching in the VGIK Gerasimov and his wife Tamara Makarova prepared many generations of Russian actors. In his last film Gerasimov played Leo Tolstoy, while Makarova was cast as Tolstoy's wife. Gerasimov is buried in the Novodevichy Cemetery of Moscow.
A rare glimpse of Sergei Gerasimov can be found in a one and a half minute behind the scenes documentary featured as part of the 'Coming From The Movies Set' series of Soviet film promos. In this piece Gerasimov can be seen in Norilsk on the set of his film "Town Planners". It's a story of two young architects struggling to build a new town in the Polar Regions. The film stars Ivan Negonov as the director of an Iron & Steel Works, Anatoly Solonitsyn as architect Kolmykov, Lyubov Virolainen as architect Arkhipova; and can be found as an extra on the 2003 DVD release of Andrei Tarkovsky's 1974 film The Mirror.
