{ "id": "epmx6hc14y", "slug": "the-commissar", "title": "The Commissar (Комиссар)", "updated": "2026-11-01", "topic_path": [ { "id": "culture", "label": "Arts and culture", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture" }, { "id": "culture.performance", "label": "Screen and stage", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen", "label": "Film and television", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films", "label": "Films and standalone screen works", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works", "label": "Individual films by title and year", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical", "label": "War and historical films (individual works)", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical.war-action-and-adventure", "label": "War action and adventure", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical.war-action-and-adventure" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical.war-action-and-adventure.war-action-films-released-through-1999", "label": "War action films released through 1999", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical.war-action-and-adventure.war-action-films-released-through-1999" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical.war-action-and-adventure.war-action-films-released-through-1999.yr-1963-1998", "label": "Released 1963 to 1998", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical.war-action-and-adventure.war-action-films-released-through-1999.yr-1963-1998" } ], "geo": [ { "id": "geo.eeu.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical", "label": "Eastern Europe · 1946 to 2000: War and historical films (individual works)", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.eeu.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical", "path": [ { "id": "geo.eeu", "label": "Eastern Europe", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.eeu" }, { "id": "geo.eeu.t1946", "label": "Eastern Europe · 1946 to 2000", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.eeu.t1946" }, { "id": "geo.eeu.t1946.culture", "label": "Arts and culture", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.eeu.t1946.culture" }, { "id": "geo.eeu.t1946.culture.performance", "label": "Screen and stage", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.eeu.t1946.culture.performance" }, { "id": "geo.eeu.t1946.culture.performance.screen", "label": "Film and television", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.eeu.t1946.culture.performance.screen" }, { "id": "geo.eeu.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films", "label": "Films and standalone screen works", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.eeu.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films" }, { "id": "geo.eeu.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works", "label": "Individual films by title and year", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.eeu.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works" }, { "id": "geo.eeu.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical", "label": "War and historical films (individual works)", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.eeu.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical" } ] } ], "excerpt": "The Commissar (Комиссар) is Alexander Askoldov's 1967 Soviet drama based on Vasily Grossman's story \"In the Town of Berdichev\", starring Nonna Mordyukova; banned in 1968, shelved about twenty years, released 1987–1988, and awarded a Silver Bear in Berlin.", "snippet": "The Commissar (Комиссар) is Alexander Askoldov's 1967 Soviet drama based on Vasily Grossman's story \"In the Town of Berdichev\", starring Nonna Mordyukova; banned in 1968, shelved about twenty years, released 1987–1988, and awarded a Silver Bear in Berlin.", "node": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.war-historical.war-action-and-adventure.war-action-films-released-through-1999.yr-1963-1998", "markdown": "# The Commissar (Комиссар)\n\n**The Commissar** (Комиссар) is a 1967 Soviet black-and-white drama directed by Alexander Askoldov, based on [Vasily Grossman](https://www.edgepedia.org/vasily-grossman)'s short story \"In the Town of Berdichev\" (В городе Бердичеве), about a [Red Army](https://www.edgepedia.org/red-army) commissar who gives birth during the [Russian Civil War](https://www.edgepedia.org/russian-civil-war) and must choose between motherhood and her military duty.[1](https://www.belcanto.ru/film_komissar.html) • [2](https://www.mosfilm.ru/cinema/films/komissar/) Shot at the Gorky Film Studio in 1967, it was banned, shelved for about twenty years, and completed at Mosfilm in 1988; it went on to win the Silver Bear at the Berlin Film Festival and a series of other international and Russian awards.[2](https://www.mosfilm.ru/cinema/films/komissar/) • [3](https://gorkyfilm.ru/catalog/zolotaya-kollekcziya/komissar/) It remained Askoldov's only feature film.[4](https://www.judaicslavicjournal.org/index.php/jsj/article/download/142/150)\n\n| Key fact | Detail |\n|---|---|\n| Director and script | Alexander Askoldov (1932–2018), his first and only feature film[1](https://www.belcanto.ru/film_komissar.html) • [4](https://www.judaicslavicjournal.org/index.php/jsj/article/download/142/150) |\n| Literary source | Vasily Grossman's story \"In the Town of Berdichev\"[1](https://www.belcanto.ru/film_komissar.html) |\n| Production | Gorky Film Studio, 1967; completed at Mosfilm, 1988; 109 minutes, black and white, widescreen 1:2.35[2](https://www.mosfilm.ru/cinema/films/komissar/) |\n| Leading cast | Nonna Mordyukova (Klavdia Vavilova), Rolan Bykov (Yefim Magazannik), Raisa Nedashkovskaya (Maria Magazannik), Vasily Shukshin[5](https://www.kinopoisk.ru/film/44876/cast/who_is/actor/) |\n| Key crew | Cinematographer Valery Ginsburg, composer Alfred Schnittke, production designer Sergei Serebrennikov[2](https://www.mosfilm.ru/cinema/films/komissar/) |\n| Ban and release | Banned by the Cinematography Committee on 29 July 1968; first wide showing July 1987 at the Moscow International Film Festival; Soviet release 1988[6](https://rosslovo.ru/news-history/sobytiya/sobytiya_25686.html) • [7](https://www.vokrug.tv/product/show/komissar/) • [8](https://www.kinonews.ru/movie_9729/komissar) |\n| Principal awards | Silver Bear special jury prize, FIPRESCI prize, and Otto Dibelius prize at Berlin 1988; four Nika awards in 1988[3](https://gorkyfilm.ru/catalog/zolotaya-kollekcziya/komissar/) • [7](https://www.vokrug.tv/product/show/komissar/) |\n\n## Spoilers\n\n### Plot\n\nThe action takes place during the Russian Civil War. Red Army regimental commissar Klavdia Vavilova, hardened by military life, learns with alarm that she is pregnant. Having temporarily left her regiment, she finds shelter in the southern town of Berdichev with the family of Yefim Magazannik, a poor Jewish tinsmith and father of six children. Under the influence of the family's kindness, her rigid commissar bearing softens.[9](https://otr-online.ru/kino/komissar-4622.html) • [2](https://www.mosfilm.ru/cinema/films/komissar/)\n\nAfter giving birth, Vavilova leaves her newborn son with the Magazannik family and sets off to rejoin her regiment, convinced that only on the battlefields can she win happiness for her son and for all the destitute on earth.[9](https://otr-online.ru/kino/komissar-4622.html) Askoldov described the source's humanism as the film's core: a woman commissar giving birth \"at the wrong time,\" and a Jewish family with many children that receives the event as the most important thing in a town where power changed hands fourteen times in a short period.[1](https://www.belcanto.ru/film_komissar.html)\n\n### Interpretation\n\nScholars have read the film as a work of memory as much as drama. Svetlana Pakhomova, a researcher at the Moscow School of Social and Economic Sciences (Shaninka), argues that Askoldov's design centered on commemorative intent: alongside the anti-Jewish violence of the Civil War period that follows from Grossman's source, the film includes a prophetic scene echoing the iconography of the Holocaust, and its commemoration of collective terror is joined by memory of personalized victims. Askoldov's own father, a Jew and a commissar, died in the Great Terror, a fact not directly mentioned in the film.[4](https://www.judaicslavicjournal.org/index.php/jsj/article/download/142/150) Contemporary critics also noted parallels between the film, drawn from Grossman's story, and his later novel *Life and Fate*.[11](https://www.kinopoisk.ru/film/44876/)\n\n## Cast and crew\n\nNonna Mordyukova played Klavdia Vavilova, Rolan Bykov played Yefim Magazannik, and Raisa Nedashkovskaya played his wife Maria; the large cast also included Lyudmila Volynskaya, Vasily Shukshin, Otarkoberidze (Отар Коберидзе), Sergei Nikonenko, and child actors Lyubov Kats, Pavel Levin, Dmitry Kleiman, and Igor Fishman.[5](https://www.kinopoisk.ru/film/44876/cast/who_is/actor/) • [10](https://www.afisha.ru/movie/komissar-165689/cast/) Askoldov said he never doubted who should play the commissar: only Mordyukova, whose first takes he called the best and whose performance he believed would enter viewers' consciousness as an image of the Revolution.[1](https://www.belcanto.ru/film_komissar.html)\n\nBehind the camera, the film united cinematographer Valery Ginsburg, production designer Sergei Serebrennikov, and composer Alfred Schnittke, with Askoldov writing the screenplay as well as directing.[2](https://www.mosfilm.ru/cinema/films/komissar/)\n\n## Production and censorship\n\nThe film was shot at the [Gorky Film Studio](https://www.edgepedia.org/gorky-film-studio) in 1967, but Askoldov was not allowed to finish the work. After studio and state discussions that ran through 1967, including a session of the Cinematography Committee on 29 December 1967 devoted entirely to the film, the committee banned it from exhibition on 29 July 1968.[2](https://www.mosfilm.ru/cinema/films/komissar/) • [11](https://www.kinopoisk.ru/film/44876/) • [6](https://rosslovo.ru/news-history/sobytiya/sobytiya_25686.html) Officials judged its view of the revolution and the Civil War ideologically unacceptable; the Chairman of the Cinematography Committee, Alexei Romanov, declared the film \"completely unacceptable for our screen.\"[12](https://www.mediagram.ru/netcat_files/108/110/h_83be718f4411b9b4e21c7e3a72ca037e)\n\nThe consequences for the director were severe. Because Askoldov continued to appeal for the film's release, he was dismissed from his job and expelled from the Communist Party in 1969, and was barred from working in cinema for many years.[12](https://www.mediagram.ru/netcat_files/108/110/h_83be718f4411b9b4e21c7e3a72ca037e) According to later accounts, the negatives were ordered destroyed as a work \"harmful and defaming the ideals of the revolution,\" but the material survived: Mosfilm credits the employees of Gosfilmofond with preserving it, and one account names the archive worker Galina Karaeva, who kept the cut film and returned it to the director.[2](https://www.mosfilm.ru/cinema/films/komissar/) • [13](https://www.exodusmagazine.org/pictures/products/products_file_Wl8E1nMkGs.pdf)\n\n## Release and reception\n\nA restored copy was completed in 1987, and the film was first shown to a broad audience in July 1987 at the Moscow International Film Festival, in the Professional Club of Cinematographers.[4](https://www.judaicslavicjournal.org/index.php/jsj/article/download/142/150) • [7](https://www.vokrug.tv/product/show/komissar/) It was finished at Mosfilm in 1988 and released in Soviet distribution that year, with a Russian premiere date of 17 June 1988; recorded box office was $388,029.[2](https://www.mosfilm.ru/cinema/films/komissar/) • [8](https://www.kinonews.ru/movie_9729/komissar)\n\n**International recognition** came quickly. At the Berlin Film Festival in 1988 the film received a special jury Silver Bear, the FIPRESCI prize, and the Otto Dibelius prize of the international evangelical jury.[3](https://gorkyfilm.ru/catalog/zolotaya-kollekcziya/komissar/) In 1988 and 1989 it also collected a special jury prize for best direction at the festival in Ghent, grand prizes at festivals in Jerusalem and Kemper, the grand prize of the San Francisco International Jewish Film Festival, the Golden Dolphin grand prize at the Troia festival in Setubal, and other honors.[7](https://www.vokrug.tv/product/show/komissar/)\n\nAt home, the film received four Nika awards of the Russian Academy of Cinematographic Arts in 1988: best actor for Rolan Bykov, best supporting role for Raisa Nedashkovskaya, best cinematography for Valery Ginsburg, and best music for Alfred Schnittke.[7](https://www.vokrug.tv/product/show/komissar/)\n\n## References\n\n1. [Фильм Александра Аскольдова «Комиссар», Belcanto.ru](https://www.belcanto.ru/film_komissar.html)\n2. [Комиссар, Киностудия «Мосфильм»](https://www.mosfilm.ru/cinema/films/komissar/)\n3. [Комиссар — Золотая коллекция, Киностудия им. М. Горького](https://gorkyfilm.ru/catalog/zolotaya-kollekcziya/komissar/)\n4. [Светлана Пахомова. Еврейская тема общечеловеческого масштаба: память о насилии в картине Александра Аскольдова «Комиссар», Judaic-Slavic Journal (2024)](https://www.judaicslavicjournal.org/index.php/jsj/article/download/142/150)\n5. [Комиссар (1967) — актеры и съемочная группа, Кинопоиск](https://www.kinopoisk.ru/film/44876/cast/who_is/actor/)\n6. [Запрещён к показу фильм Александра Аскольдова «Комиссар», Rosslovo](https://rosslovo.ru/news-history/sobytiya/sobytiya_25686.html)\n7. [Комиссар, Vokrug.tv](https://www.vokrug.tv/product/show/komissar/)\n8. [Фильм Комиссар (1967), Kinonews](https://www.kinonews.ru/movie_9729/komissar)\n9. [Комиссар, Общественное Телевидение России](https://otr-online.ru/kino/komissar-4622.html)\n10. [Актеры и режиссеры фильма Комиссар, Афиша](https://www.afisha.ru/movie/komissar-165689/cast/)\n11. [Комиссар (1967), Кинопоиск](https://www.kinopoisk.ru/film/44876/)\n12. [Действие драмы «Комиссар» происходит в эпоху гражданской войны, Mediagram](https://www.mediagram.ru/netcat_files/108/110/h_83be718f4411b9b4e21c7e3a72ca037e)\n13. [Режиссер одной картины, Exodus Magazine](https://www.exodusmagazine.org/pictures/products/products_file_Wl8E1nMkGs.pdf)\n\n---\n*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › War and historical films (individual works) › War action and adventure › War action films released through 1999 › Released 1963 to 1998*\n\n*Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*\n\n*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*\n\nLicense: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license\n", "same_as": [], "url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/the-commissar", "markdown_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/the-commissar.md", "license": { "name": "Edgepedia Community License 1.0", "url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license", "summary": "Free with credit, commercial use included. AI training is open to everyone. For other uses, organizations over USD 100M in revenue or 100M monthly users license separately.", "spdx": "LicenseRef-Edgepedia-Community-1.0" }, "credit": "\"The Commissar (Комиссар)\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), https://www.edgepedia.org/the-commissar. Edgepedia Community License 1.0.", "credit_md": "\"[The Commissar (Комиссар)](https://www.edgepedia.org/the-commissar)\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), [https://www.edgepedia.org/the-commissar](https://www.edgepedia.org/the-commissar). [Edgepedia Community License 1.0](https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license).", "credit_html": "\"The Commissar (Комиссар)\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), https://www.edgepedia.org/the-commissar. Edgepedia Community License 1.0.", "speakable": "The Commissar is Alexander Askoldov's 1967 Soviet drama based on Vasily Grossman's story \"In the Town of Berdichev\", starring Nonna Mordyukova; banned in 1968, shelved about twenty years, released 1987–1988, and awarded a Silver Bear in Berlin." }