1. – Emir Kusturica, L’affaire Farewell, France, 2009. One Eastern bloc film-maker for another as the Serbian took over from the Russian in Christian Carion’s true-life espionage thriller. He told Mikhalkov: “I know a Russian story you don’t know.” “Impossible! I know everything in Russia.” “Except this one,” said Carion, recounting the story of Farewell, code-name for a KGB colonel passing defence technology to French intelligence and naming KGB agents who had infiltrated Western industry and governments. “He was surprised not to know it – and by the story itself.” Alas Mikhalkov had his own movie to make, a sequel to his Oscar-winning Burnt By The Sun. He suggested Moscow stage and screen star Sergei Makovetsky – immediately warned off by the Culture Minister Alexander Avdeev (expelled by France when Russia’s ambassador in Paris during the Farewell case). Makovetsky told Carion: “Forget me. Forget my number. Forget my name.” And joined the Mikhalkov sequel.
Birth year: Death year: Other name: Casting Calls: 1