Personal Info

Known For

Directing

Gender

Male

Birthday

September 5, 1897

Died

November 3, 1980 (83 years old)

Place of Birth

Bialystok, Grodno Province, Russian Empire (now Poland)

Also Known As

Михаил Кауфман
Кауфман Михайло Абрамович
Михайло Кауфман
М. Кауфман

IMDb Profile

Mikhail Kaufman

Biography

Mikhail Kaufman was a Soviet cinematographer and photographer. In the 1920s, after Mikhail Kaufman returned from the Russian Civil War, his brother director Dziga Vertov offered him the opportunity to participate in his newsreel series Kino-Pravda as a cameraman.

Kaufman directed photography for several films, including Vertov's Man with the Movie Camera. The film is built around meta-reference and is full of innovative visual effects: in it, Kaufman acts as a cameraman and is seen shooting the film while walking on high bridges, hanging off the side of a train, climbing a smokestack and crawling underground with miners – all in order to get the best shot.

Mikhail Kaufman directed three films: Moscow (1927), In Spring (1929), and An Unprecedented Campaign (1931).