How the Soviet Army starred in movies

Many large-scale Soviet movie epics would never have seen the light of day if not for the help of the Soviet Ministry of Defense. It assisted movie studios with their consultants, necessary props and, of course, personnel.

Thus, for the filming of the movie ‘The Fire Bulge’ from the series ‘Liberation’ in 1967, the General Staff supplied the ‘Mosfilm’ film studio with 25 ‘T-34’ tanks, eight ‘IS-3’ tanks, seven BM-13 ‘Katyusha’ rocket launchers, dozens of artillery and anti-aircraft guns, hundreds of Soviet rifles from the war and even captured German small arms.

Thousands of servicemen from the 41st Guards Tank Division took part in the production of the ‘The Fire Bulge’ at that time. Because of this, the formation had to significantly limit its participation in the large-scale ‘Dnieper-67’ general military exercises of the Armed Forces of the Soviet Union.

The Ministry of Defense wasn’t always delighted with cooperating with movie industry personalities. The military had its own tasks for combat training and the constant "pulling out" of soldiers and equipment by film studios for their own needs hindered their fulfillment.

The military worked most successfully with director Sergei Bondarchuk. Up to 18,000 soldiers and officers of the Soviet Army took part in the filming of ‘War and Peace’.

The leadership of the Ministry of Defense was given a private screening of the filmed battle scenes, which they were very pleased with. They were even more pleased that not a single serviceman was harmed during the filming. Therefore, in the future, the director didn’t have any problems with the obtaining the necessary personnel in the future productions of ‘Waterloo’ and ‘They Fought for the Motherland’.

It was during the filming of ‘War and Peace’ that a military unit was born, which only had one task - to star in movies. Before its disbandment in 2002, the 11th Independent Cavalry Regiment starred in dozens of movies and TV series, including the movie epic by Bondarchuk, the cult western ‘White Sun of the Desert’ and the popular historical TV series ‘Gardemarines, Go!’

At the same time, the Soviet Army was filmed not only in historical projects. In ‘In the Zone of Special Attention’ and ‘Hit Back’, it played itrself - these action-packed movies are devoted to the exercises of the Soviet Armed Forces.

Interestingly, not everything that was caught on film then could be shown to a mass audience. For reasons of secrecy, some of the footage was destroyed.