Sergei Bodrov

6.8 Freedom Is Paradise (1989)
6.5 Prisoner of the Mountains (1996)
4.9 Running Free (2000)
4.3 Seventh Son (2014)

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A native of the Far East of Russia, Sergei Bodrov (Russia, 1948) debuted in the Brezhnev era, with Sladkiy Sok Vnutri Travy/ Sweet Dreams in the Grass (1984) and Neprofessionaly/ Non-Professionals (1985), the latter shot on location in black and white in the Central Asian steppes with mostly non-professional actors, and rose to prominence with Svoboda Eto Rai/ Freedom Is Paradise (1989) during the glasnost era, starring a real-life reform-school inmate and featuring a quasi-documentary representation of prison life, followed by Katala/ The Gambler (1989), Ya Khotela Uvidet Angelov/ I Wanted to See Angels (1992), Belyy Korol Krasnaya Koroleva/ White King Red Queen (1993) and Kavkazskiy Plennik/ Prisoner of the Mountains (1996), in theory ad adaptation of Lev Tolstoy's short story but de facto an ethnographic tribute to Chechen culture made at the time of the first independence war of 1994-96.

Relocating to California, Bodrov directed the English-language Running Free (2000), set in the German colony of Namibia at the time of World War I, the gangster movie The Quickie (2001), Bear's Kiss (2002), etc. He then amde the historical epics Koshpendiler/ Nomad (2005), in Russian, and Mongol (2007), the latter in Mongolian and Chinese.

A Yakuza's Daughter Never Cries (2010)

the English-language Seventh Son (2014)

Dyshite Svobodno/ Breathe Easy (2022)