Imagine that there is no movie in the world … In general, completely, that is, it is not at all! Imagined? It’s hard, because cinema is an incredible enthusiastic world, a part of world culture. And the contribution to the world cinema heritage is also difficult to imagine without Zhytomyr

Demonstration of the achievements of the first domestic documentary filmmaker of the then Tsarist Russia, Alfred Fedetskyi, was held in Kharkiv, although he was born in Zhytomyr. At the cinema show for Kharkiv, held in September 1896, Fedetskyi demonstrated the first documentary film in the Russian Empire “The View of the Kharkiv Station at the time of the train’s departure”. And the first public cinema session was held in December at the Kharkiv Opera House, where a screen of 12 arshins and 10 arshins was placed at a height (Appendix: arshin – a measure of length equal to 0 7112 m). The event took place almost at a time when their achievements were demonstrated by Lumiere brothers.
And the Zhytomyr people first saw a miracle cinema on Aug. 21, 1897 in a city theater on Pushkinskaya Street (now a regional philharmonic). This session was attended by Ukrainian writer Mikhail Kotsyubinskyi, who at that time worked in the editorial office of the newspaper “Volyn”. In a letter to his wife, he wrote: “I went to the theater to watch sine-matraf. Going behind the scenes look at the device – it’s also very interesting. ”
The shooting of the first chronicle film in Zhytomyr “The complaining tuple with the remains of prematurely dead Matiyevich-Matsievychi brothers on April 25, 1911 in Zhytomyr” was performed by Vladimir Volodymyr Dobrzhanskyi.
In 1916, in the book “All Cinematography,” it was reported that there were 5 cinemas in Zhytomyr (as in Sevastopol, Simferopol, Feodosia and Yalta). For comparison: in Berdichev – 3, in Kiev – 12 and, most of all, in Odessa – 26.
The name of Oleksandr Dovzhenko, Ukrainian writer, director and film director is clearly associated with Ukrainian cinematography. Dovzhenko Street in Zhytomyr is a sign of respect from the inhabitants of the city in which the young Dovzhenko began as a teacher. The teacher of the Second Higher Primary School of History, Geography, Natural Sciences, Physics, Gymnastics and Drawing organized literary and musical evenings, and later found in his city his first love – Varvara Krylov. Then Alexander Dovzhenko will work as a teacher at the Red Army School at the headquarters of the 44th Infantry Division, and will come later to Zhitomir to film a cinematic story about Nikolai Shchors (“Shchors”, 1939).
Film director Moritz Borisovich Umansky was born in Zhytomyr. His filmography is 20 films that are well remembered by our grandmothers and grandfathers. What is worthy of the movie “Spy’s feat”. But his son Henry Umansky chose for himself a more optimistic way – the animation. Without exaggeration, it can be argued that all the children of Ukraine know about the funny Capitol.
The cinema of neighboring Poland has also been enriched by our fellow countrymen: the Polish actor Mitsislava Pavlikovsky, who was born in our city, knows both adults and children. At least they have heard, because for a Polish boy, he spoke in the voice of one of the heroes of the Disney cartoon about Peter Pena. Mechislav Pavlikovsky starred in 21 films – a huge contribution to the history of Polish cinema, and still received the love and recognition of the viewer.
In Soviet times, Zhytomyr was the capital of amateur cinema, and the first film-maker, who glued 35-millimeter film and made a homemade movie camera, was our countryman. By the way, get to the zhytomyr festival “Golden Polissya”, where the best amateur film makers were shown, every dream of a cinema actor.
Modern and past are closely connected not only with cinema, but also with life. A valuable film discovery of one of the most expensive and most successful films of the 1920s, “Taras Treyaslo”, which was filmed live in Kiev, Zhytomyr, Dnipropetrovsk and Uman, was presented to Kyiv in the framework of the “Voiceless Nights” film festival in May this year.
There are absolutely topical news in the film history of Zhytomyr. Documentary-drama film of Zhytomir citizen Valentina Vasianovich “Black level” was nominated for the 90th anniversary ceremony of awarding the most prestigious film awards – “Oscar” prize.
About ten years Zhytomyr College of Culture and Arts named after. Ivan Ogienko is preparing footage for the film industry, and it is likely that his graduates will create new prominent pages of cinema history that we will be proud of in the future.

Translated by Aliona Matushevich