First Teacher[Первый учитель](1965) USSRDirected by Andrei KonchalovskiiWritten by Chingiz Aitmatov, Boris Dobrodeev, and Andrei Konchalovskii, based on a story by Chingiz Aitmatov. Cinematography by Georgii Rerberg. Art direction by Mikhail Romadin. With Natal'ia Arinbasarova, Bolot Beishenaliev, Darkul' Kuiukova, Idris Nogaibaev, Kasym Zharkinbaev, and Sovetbek Dzhumadylov. In Russian with English subtitles | 
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First Teacher was
Andrei Konchalovskii's diploma-film, the film with which the young director
completed his studies at the All-Union State Filmmaking Institute in Moscow.
He chose a historical subject for his film. The end of the civil war in the
early 1920s gave the new regime the opportunity to spread its ideology
throughout its vast territory, and the fervent members of the Communist Party
undertook this task with missionary zeal. Diuishen, The First Teacher to
arrive in a small Kirghiz village has the daunting task of bringing both
knowledge and belief in the revolution to a world that is not at all prepared
for change. | Andrei Mikhalkov-Konchalovskii
was born in Moscow in 1937. His early studies throughout the 1950s were
devoted to music at the Moscow Conservatory. In 1965 he completed his
course of studies in film directing at the All-Union State Filmmaking
Institute, where he worked with Mikhail Romm. He has appeared as an actor
in such films as My Name Is Ivan and Lenin's Guard, and
co-wrote the screenplay for Tarkovsky's masterpiece Andrei Rublev.
His diploma film, The First Teacher, was quickly followed by his
famous Story of Asya Klyachina, which was released in a strongly
censored version in 1971. Despite official disapproval of that film, he
continued a successful directing career in the Soviet Union and, in the
1980s, in the United States. His most recent films have been
international joint productions.
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