Sergei Kostin is a spy novelist, expert in the history of espionage, and documentary film maker. Graduating from the Moscow State Institute of Foreign Languages, Kostin refused an offer to collaborate with Soviet intelligence, preferring to work as a translator in Algeria. He returned to the theme of espionage during the Nineties, after being graduated from Cinema College (VGIK) as scriptwriter and while working for Russian and French TV Channels.

To mark the centenary of Leo Tolstoy’s death, Academia Rossica with support from the "Russkiy Mir" Foundation (Moscow) and the Russian Embassy in London presents a programme of film adaptations of the writer’s greatest works and a documentary film about Tolstoy and his family based on the archival footage made in 1908-1910.

29 October - 7 November, Apollo Piccadilly
The 4th Russian Film starts this Friday, 29 October, featuring the best in new Russian film, documentaries and animation and opens with The Ugly Duckling, master animator Garry Bardin's sparky and affecting stop-motion animation with Orwellian overtones. All films are shown in Russian with English subtitles.

29 September, 7.30pm at the Institut français
Author of 'A Russian Novel' Emmanuel Carrère joins Tibor Fischer for a talk on Identity. A Russian Novel traces Carrère’s pursuit of three obsessions: a good story, the disappearance of his Russian grandfather and his fascination with a woman he loves but cannot keep from destroying.
The talk will be followed by the screening of Emmanuel Carrère's documentary on Russia, Retour à Kotelnitch

4th Russian Film Festival, 29 October – 7 November Dear Friends! The Russian Film Festival is getting ready to present London with this year's best premieres in Russian cinema. The Main Programme As always, the main festival programme showcases the best Russian films, award-winners at major international and Russian film festivals. These films include, 'Silent Souls' (Ovsyanki), directed by Alexei Fedorchenko and winner of three prizes at the Venice Film Festival, 'How I Ended This Summer' by Alexei Popogrebsky, awarded prizes for best actor and best cinematography at the Berlinale, 'One War' by Vera Glagoleva, Grand Prix winner at Sofia International Film Festival and Russia's nomination for the Oscars and Svetlana Proscurina's latest film 'The Truce', winner of the main prize at Kinotavr. As in previous years, guests include directors, producers and actors who come to London specially to present their films at the festival. Documentaries – 'Noughties Art' This year's documentary programme sums up the last decade with screenings of the ten best Russian documentary films, one for each year. The programme is presented by the great director and documentary maker, Vitaly Mansky, president of the ArtDocFest. Animation Alongside the main programme and documentaries, we have also put together a comprehensive and diverse programme of animation. As part of our festival 'Astral dogs Belka and Strelka' take a trip to outer space captained by director Inna Evlannikova, while Irina Evteeva, famous for her graceful and original style, brings 'Little Tragedies' to the screen. These films will capture the hearts of adults and childen alike. As well as an extensive programme of full length animation, we will be screening a special programme for our young audiences, presenting the best of award-winning Russian animated films of recent years Special Screenings This year's film festival also includes a retrospective of the great actor and director Sergei Bondarchuk's films and the works of Leo Tolstoy on film, as well as a retrospective of masters of Soviet and Russian animation. Venue For the fourth year in a row the Russian Film Festival will take place at the Apollo Piccadilly, one of London's best cinemas.

9 May is a very special day – Victory Day. It is particularly special for Russia, since of all countries it paid the heaviest price for its own freedom and for the freedom of other countries from fascism. This is our common victory. It became possible only thanks to the joint efforts of all allies and the struggle of those who fought against fascism in their own countries. On this day we celebrate life and freedom and commemorate those who gave up their lives for us during the World War II.

Yume Pictures and Academia Rossica are delighted to invite you to a special screening of the film 'A Room and a Half' at 8pm on 10 May at Cine Lumière, South Kensington, London, SW7 2DT, followed by Q&A with director Andrey Khrzhanovsky and actress Alisa Freyndlikh. It is a beautifully mesmerising film based on the life of the Russian poet Joseph Brodsky.

Boris Ryzhy Director Aliona van der Horst NETHERLANDS/2008/BETACAM/COLOUR/59 MIN/RUSSIAN ENGLISH SUBTITLES Prize-winning documentary film by Aliona van der Horst about Russian poet Boris Ryzhy "All of my poems speak only of love and death," wrote Russian poet Boris Ryzhy (1974-2001) in 2000. "But all the same, I'm happy with my wife and son." One year later, the charming young tough, who had already achieved considerable literary renown, hanged himself-in so doing following in the footsteps of many Russian artists before him. The author of a thousand poems and recipient of Russia's most prestigious literary prize, he was only 26 years old. Trying to understand what drove him to suicide, van der Horst uncovers the hidden drama of the entire perestroika generation, for which Boris Ryzhy was the standard bearer. "We were deprived of communism without being given access to capitalism," explains his widow. The perestroika years of the Yeltsin era, a time that we in the West associate with democracy and freedom, have an entirely different meaning in the anarchic streets of Yekaterinenburg, the industrial city where Ryzhy grew up and which so marked his life and work. However, despite this dark reality, Ryzhy's love of life is what comes to the fore in van der Horst's poetic film: through his work, pain is transformed into grace.

3rd RUSSIAN FILM FESTIVAL 30 October – 8 November 2009 Apollo Piccadilly, London T: 0871 220 6000 Academia Rossica is proud to present 10 UK premieres of award-winning Russian films produced in. All films with English subtitles. Programme director: Andrey Plakhov, President of FIPRESCI. The festival opens on 30 October with a new adaptation of Anna Karenina by one of Russia’s most defiant film directors, Sergei Soloviev. The film took 14 years to make and it is part of Soloviev’s trilogy ASSA (1987) – ASSA-2 (2009) – Anna Karenina (2009). Full programme of the Festival:

Coverage of Question Time at the 3rd Russian Film Festival is now up on the Academia Rossica YouTube channel. Question Time was a new event at the RFF and featured award-winning documentary maker Vitaly Mansky and leading film critic Andrei Plakhov answering pertinent questions submitted by members of the public via our website.

26 May
Moscow
On the 26th of May, the names of the writers shortlisted for the 'Big Book' literary prize were announced. 13 authors have been shortlisted. Two of the shortlisted books were entered into the competition as manuscripts: Mariam Petrosyan's 'The House Where'and Andrei Baldin's 'The Extension of the Full Stop'.

3rd RUSSIAN FILM FESTIVAL 30 October – 8 November 2009 Apollo Piccadilly, London T: 0871 220 6000 Academia Rossica is proud to present 10 UK premieres of award-winning Russian films produced in. All films with English subtitles. Programme director: Andrey Plakhov, President of FIPRESCI. The festival opens on 30 October with a new adaptation of Anna Karenina by one of Russia’s most defiant film directors, Sergei Soloviev. The film took 14 years to make and it is part of Soloviev’s trilogy ASSA (1987) – ASSA-2 (2009) – Anna Karenina (2009). Full programme of the Festival:

Alexander Arkhangelsky was born in Moscow in 1962. He graduated in pedagogy and wrote a dissertation about Pushkin. At different times he has been a radio-journalist, written for literary journals and political newspapers, and has taught.

The special documentary programme will include both feature length and short films of famous and emerging Russian filmmakers.

May 2008
Cannes, France
It seems that for Russian cinema, good things come in threes: the Russian film industry suitably showcased at the first ever Russian film pavilion; leading Russian production and distribution companies present their best creations at the International Marché du Film; and stunning triumphs for first-time feature film directors Sergei Dvortsevoy and Valeria Gai-Germanika!

The special documentary programme will include both feature length and short films of famous and emerging Russian filmmakers.

Film producer, founder of the Telluride Film Festival and jury member of numerous international film festivals
Tom has been the programme curator for the Documentary Film Institute, San Francisco State University since 2005. In 1974, Tom co-founded the Telluride Film Festival along with Bill Pence and James Card.

The special documentary programme will include both feature length and short films of famous and emerging Russian filmmakers.

Director of London International Documentary Film Festival
Patrick Hazard is the Director of PocketVisions and of LIDF. He trained as an anthropologist at University College London and has carried out research in Turin and Barcelona.

Director, 'Virginity'
He was born in Lvov in 1963 and graduated from the filmmaking school VGIK in 1990. His career in documentary films took off in 1999, when he became the writer and presenter of the Russian television show 'Real Cinema'.

Senior Lecturer at Queen Mary, University of London
He is the author of 'Dziga Vertov: Defining Documentary Film', and various articles on Russian and Soviet film, literature and journalism.

Writer and filmmaker
He is the director of the forthcoming feature film, Folie à Deux, and Lanterna Magicka, a documentary about the Scottish filmmaker Bill Douglas and early cinema.

Director of TV series about Russia, 'Oligarchs'
Patrick is one of Britain's leading documentary film makers, with a particular commitment to quality of image and depth of analysis - his series on the National Trust won both critical acclaim and the Bafta for best factual series, and gave BBC4 its highest ever audience.

Independent documentary filmmaker
Among his credits are “The King of Communism: the pomp and pageantry Nicolae Ceausescu”, which won a Grierson Award in 2002, and “Hammer and Tickle: the Communist Joke Book”, which was premiered at the New York Tribeca Film Festival 2006 and won best documentary at the Zurich Film Festival in the same year.

Film producer, founder of the Telluride Film Festival and jury member of numerous international film festivals
Tom has been the programme curator for the Documentary Film Institute, San Francisco State University since 2005. In 1974, Tom co-founded the Telluride Film Festival along with Bill Pence and James Card.

Filmmaker, historian
Evgeny Tsymbal is the only BAFTA-winning Russian film director. Little known to mainstream film goers, he is well respected in Russian and European artistic and intellectual circles as a documentary filmmaker, writer and film historian.