Arsenov Pavel Oganezovich: biography and filmography

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

How do great ideas and great stories begin? From an accidental conversation on the train? Or from meeting great writers who generously scatter the seeds of creative ideas into the fertile soil of talented directors? Or maybe from a wonderful fairy tale seen from the movie screen in early childhood?..

Childhood

Not much is known about Pavel Arsenov's biography.

He was born on one of the sunny days of the warm Tbilisi winter - January 05, 1936, in the family of a simple Armenian artisan Oganez Arsenov. The adult life of the future famous director began early - in the hungry and ruthless doorways of front-line Tbilisi, where he, a tall and broad-shouldered seven-year-old, fought with boys almost twice his age. Having lost the next battle, he did not give up and climbed into battle again.

Thus the character was tempered and the personality of Paul was brought up. However, everything around faded and lost its meaning when the screen of the nearest cinema was illuminated by the light of a beautiful and kind children's fairy tale "Vasilisa the Beautiful", which came out just during the war. Holding his breath and rounding his eyes with admiration, Pavel Arsenov againturned into a little boy, returning to the lost world of childhood. He went to this fairy tale about twenty times, no less. And each time, he still worried whether Ivan and the bewitched Vasilisa would cope with the trials that fell to their lot.

As Pavel Oganezovich later recalled, if it were not for this wonderful fairy tale that happened to him in childhood, and, in fact, gave him childhood itself, everything in his life would have turned out completely differently.

Youth

Tall, stately, athletic and skilled in his father, Pavel, in fact, could easily earn his living. By the time he graduated from one of the Tbilisi schools, he already had a rather tolerable command of scissors and a comb and could work, for example, as a hairdresser. He liked to skillfully carve interesting figures from wood and could sell them at the local market. In the end, having an outstanding and spectacular appearance, he could just take it and marry the daughter of some we althy Georgian.

However, young Pavel Oganezovich Arsenov, having decided to follow the path of knowledge, enters the Janelidze Institute of Geology in Tbilisi. However, he was not destined to become a geologist, because even while studying at the institute, in memory of those happy childhood memories and experiencing an irresistible desire to somehow touch the great art, he got a job at the film studio "Georgia-Film". This event served as the starting point for his entire future life, inextricably linked with the world of cinema.

Career start

Soon Pavel Arsenov moves to Moscow and enters the directing department of the All-Russian State Institute of Cinematography, where Grigory Roshal himself was his teacher. While studying, he earned his living and gained experience in the studio of popular science films. Then, in 1960, Pavel made his film debut, playing the courageous and honest fireman Akop in the drama "Voices of Our Quarter".

In 1963, after graduating from the Institute of Cinematography, he began his independent directorial career, shooting short film novels "Sunflower" and "Lelka". There, during the filming of "Sunflower", Pavel met his first wife, the increasingly popular actress Valentina Malyavina.

First marriage

The fatal beauty-actress Valentina Malyavina played a destructive role in the personal life of Pavel Arsenov.

Muscovite Valya got into the cinema by accident, having fallen in love since school, as usual beauties, with a local hooligan and heartthrob who charmed the entire female half of the Arbat. This lucky person turned out to be the future People's Artist of the RSFSR, Alexander Zbruev, who quickly reciprocated the eighteen-year-old Malyavina.

At first, the young couple hid their relationship, and only after a secret wedding opened up to their parents. However, their marriage was not destined to last long - four years later Valentina leaves for Arsenov.

They met on set and became close very soon. Malyavina did not hide their relationship from Zbruev, and verya divorce from her first husband soon followed, immediately after which Pavel and Valentina got married.

Pavel Oganezovich treated his wife very touchingly. Surrounding her with care and attention, he built their cozy family nest. After some time, the couple had a girl. However, the parental happiness of the newlyweds was very short-lived - after a few children, the baby died of an infection.

From that moment on, their family life was in discord.

Effective brunette Malyavina still enjoyed the same success with men. Soon she started an affair with the already popular actor Alexander Kaidanovsky. Despite the fact that Malyavina was still married, and Kaidanovsky was married, their relationship boiled over with truly insane passion. They staged scenes of public jealousy and cut each other's veins in order to, as expected, die on the same day. Mired in some kind of half-drunk frenzy, Malyavina even lived for some time at the same time with both Arsenov and Kaidanovsky, parting with both in 1969.

And when she left, sadness settled forever in the heart of Pavel Arsenov.

Elena

The second time the director was able to marry only after seven years.

A young girl Elena married Arsenov in 1976. She was only twenty, and she was two times younger than her chosen one.

However, this did not prevent her from living with Pavel Oganezovich for twenty-three years, until his death, completely devoting her life to her beloved husband and helping him in his work.

In 1980,the couple had a daughter, Elizabeth, who later became a theatrical makeup stylist.

Guest from the future

On March 25, 1985, director Pavel Arsenov made a gift to millions of Soviet schoolchildren by making, perhaps, the most important film of his life - the iconic "Guest from the Future", based on the science fiction writer Kir Bulychev's book "One Hundred Years Ahead".

Teenagers all over the country fell in love with the heroes of the film. None of the domestic films for children has won such popularity yet.

Few of the audience did not shed tears on the song "Beautiful Far Away" in the final credits. And now, many of yesterday's schoolchildren, who have already managed to acquire grandchildren, as soon as this wonderful song begins to sound, each time they return back to their childhood, when their path, full of nagging uncertainty, was just beginning.

The soul of each of them is filled with an amazing feeling, akin to the action of a time machine from a favorite movie, and they, albeit not for long, become children again, as the little boy Pavel Arsenov once thawed after fights when watching "Vasilisa the Beautiful".

Inspired by the extraordinary success of "Guests from the Future", Pavel Oganezovich already in 1987 presented the audience with the film "Purple Ball", a continuation of the story about Alisa Selezneva, the main character of the cult TV movie.

However, this tape could not repeat its past success and failed at the box office.

90s

The filmography of the director has only twelve pictures. Almost half of them were significant for that time and remained in the memory of the audience. This, in addition to the famous "Guest from the Future", such tapes as "The Deer King", "And then I said no …", "Do not part with your loved ones".

In the mid-90s of the last century, the sunset of the once most authoritative film studio named after Gorky, where Pavel Oganezovich also worked, came to a close. First, the studio stopped making children's films, and then completely stopped its activities.

Last movie

Pavel Arsenov made his last film, "The Wizard of the Emerald City", shortly before his death. During filming, he suffers a heart attack, after which the director ends up in the hospital for a long time. Returning home, Pavel, with the help of his wife Elena, gradually returned to life and was able to continue working on the film, which was released in 1994.

After that, the director did not shoot anymore. He passed away on August 12, 1999. The cause of Pavel Arsenov's death was his heart, which had already failed him before.