Birth name
     Andrei Arsenyevich Tarkovsky
Date of birth
     4 April 1932, Zavrazhe, Ivanono, Russia
Date of death
     28 December 1986, Paris, France

Mini biography

Andrei Tarkovsky (April 4, 1932 - December 29, 1986)

The most famous Soviet film-maker since Sergei M. Eisenstein, Andrei Tarkovsky (the son of noted poet Arseniy Tarkovsky) studied music and Arabic in Moscow before enrolling in the Soviet film school VGIK.

He shot to international attention with his first feature, Ivan's Childhood (Ivanovo detstvo) (1962), which won the top prize at the Venice Film Festival.

This resulted in high expectations for his second feature Andrei Rublyov (1969), which was banned by the Soviet authorities until 1971.

“Juxtaposing a person with an environment that is boundless, collating him with a countless number of people passing by close to him and far away, relating a person to the whole world, that is the meaning of cinema.”

It was shown at the 1969 Cannes Film Festival at 4 o'clock in the morning on the last day, in order to prevent it winning a prize - but it won one nonetheless, and was eventually distributed abroad partly to enable the authorities to save face.

Solyaris (1972), had an easier ride, being acclaimed by many in the West as the Soviet answer to Kubrick's '2001' (though Tarkovsky himself was never too fond of it), but he ran into official trouble again with Zerkalo (1975), a dense, personal web of autobiographical memories with a radically innovative plot structure.

Stalker (1979) had to be completely reshot on a dramatically reduced budget after an accident in the laboratory destroyed the first version, and after Nostalghia (1983), shot in Italy (with official approval), Tarkovsky defected to the West.

His last film, Offret (1986) was shot in Sweden with many of Ingmar Bergman's regular collaborators, and won an almost unprecedented four prizes at the Cannes Film Festival. He died of cancer at the end of the year.

Director - Selected filmography

1. The Sacrifice | Offret (1986)
   
2. Nostalghia (1983)
   
3. Stalker | Сталкер (1979)
   
4. The Mirror | Зеркало | Zerkalo (1975)
   
5. Solaris | Solyaris | Солярис (1972)
   
6. Andrei Rublyov | Andrei Rublev | Страсти по Андрею | Андрей Рублев (1966)
   
7. Ivan's Childhood | Ivanovo detstvo | Иваново детство (1962)