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Valéry Inkijinoff

Valéry Inkijinoff

Actor · 1895 – 1973 · Bokhan, Irkutsk governorate, Russian Empire

Valéry Inkijinoff (Russian: Валерьян (Валерий) Иванович Инкижинов; 25 March 1895 – 26 September 1973) was a French actor of Russian-Buryat origin. His strong facial features made him a favourite villain of French cinema for exotic adventure films and crime movies. Inkijinoff was born to a Christian Buryat father and a Russian mother in Irkutsk gubernia. He studied at the Polytechnical Institute of Saint Petersburg and was for a time one of the resident actors of an imperial theater of this city. At the beginning of his career in Russia, he appeared first as stuntman in a few movies and then as director and as actor. His major lead role during the Russian part of his career is The Son in Storm Over Asia by Vsevolod Pudovkin in 1928, a major Soviet propaganda film about a fictional British consolidation of Mongolia. He was also an actor in the troop of Vsevolod Meyerhold and was then appointed as director of the movie and theater school of Kiev in Ukraine. In 1930, while in France on a European tour, he refused to return to the USSR. According to Boris Shumyatsky, after Stalin learned Inkijinoff had never returned in 1934, said: "Too bad that the man escaped. Now he, probably, is dying to come back but, alas, too late." He starred in 2 movies while living in the Soviet Union, and contrary to Stalin's assumption, Inkijinoff became immensely popular in Europe, arguably the most successful Soviet actor abroad, starring in a total of 44 French, British, German, and Italian films. In France he frequently played the part of Asian villains. His most active period was in the thirties, when he appeared in Les Bateliers de la Volga and the G. W. Pabst film Le drame de Shanghai. He played for Fritz Lang in 1959, in Der Tiger von Eschnapur and its sequel Das indische Grabmal, in which he played the role of the high priest Yama. In 1965, Philippe de Broca cast him as Monsieur Goh, the wise but scary Chinese who guarantees to the Jean-Paul Belmondo character a certain death in Les tribulations d'un Chinois en Chine. His last movie was with Brigitte Bardot and Claudia Cardinale, where he played the role of Indian chief Spitting Bull in Les pétroleuses. He was a great friend of Charles Dullin and Louis Jouvet, and had a long career in French theater, appearing for instance in Marie Galante by Jacques Deval. He died at his home in Brunoy, Essonne, France, aged 78. Source: Article "Valéry Inkijinoff" from Wikipedia in English, licensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0.

Movies22

  • Movie5.6

    Les Pétroleuses

    The Legend of Frenchie King

    1971 · 59 votes

  • Movie7.0

    Les Tribulations d'un Chinois en Chine

    Up to His Ears

    1965 · 202 votes

  • Movie6.3

    Michel Strogoff

    Michael Strogoff

    1956 · 34 votes

  • Movie5.6
  • Movie6.9

    Les Aventuriers

    The Last Adventure

    1967 · 142 votes

  • Movie6.9

    Atout cœur à Tokyo pour OSS 117

    O.S.S. 117: Mission to Tokyo

    1966 · 34 votes

  • Movie6.2

    Die Todesstrahlen des Dr. Mabuse

    The Death Ray of Dr. Mabuse

    1964 · 12 votes

  • Movie6.1

    Das indische Grabmal

    The Indian Tomb

    1959 · 120 votes

  • Movie6.3

    Der Tiger von Eschnapur

    The Tiger of Eschnapur

    1959 · 149 votes

  • Movie7.5

    Der Arzt von Stalingrad

    The Doctor of Stalingrad

    1958 · 4 votes

  • Movie6.3

    Maciste alla corte del Gran Khan

    Samson and the 7 Miracles of the World

    1961 · 10 votes

  • Movie6.8

    Le triomphe de Michel Strogoff

    The Triumph of Michael Strogoff

    1961 · 8 votes

  • Movie5.7

    La Blonde de Pékin

    The Blonde from Peking

    1967 · 21 votes

  • Movie7.0

    La Rue sans joie

    Street Without Joy

    1938 · 1 votes

  • Movie
  • Movie4.3

    The Battle

    1934 · 4 votes

  • Movie6.6
  • Movie6.1

    La Tête d'un homme

    A Man's Head

    1933 · 29 votes

  • Movie4.3

    Matchless

    1967 · 8 votes

  • Movie7.0

    La figlia di Mata Hari

    Mata Hari's Daughter

    1954 · 1 votes

  • Movie7.0

    Nick Carter va tout casser

    License to Kill

    1964 · 7 votes

  • Movie6.8