Sergey was born in Shymkent, Kazakhstan, graduated from aviation college and Novosibirsk State Technical University, where he studied radio engineering. In 1990 Dvortsevoy began studying documentary filmmaking under Leonid Gurevich and Samary Zelikin at Higher Courses for Scriptwriters and Film Directors in Moscow. His first short documentary, «Happiness» (1995), following a family of Kazakh nomads, won Grand Prix at Visions du reel, the FIPRESCI prize at Dok Leipzig and a number of other prizes in Krakow, San Francisco, Stuttgart and other cities. 

 

Sergey’s graduation project, «Bread day» (1998), detailing daily struggles of a small Russian village, was also well received by cinema critics and audiences and brought its director Dok Leipzig’s Golden Dove, Message To Man’s Golden Centaur and Visions du reel’s Best Feature Prize along with numerous other awards.

 

His next documentaries, «Highway» (about Uyghur traveling circus) and «In the dark» (about a visually-impaired mesh bag knitter) also enjoyed worldwide success and received many prestigious awards, including the main Russian film award Nika for the Best Documentary and the Golden Aries from Russian Guild of Film Critics.

 

Even with his fiction works «Tulip» (2008) and «Ayka» (2018) Dvortsevoy stayed true to his documentary filmmaker’s roots, choosing to film with a small crew and avoid building a set. Both movies were universally recognized as masterpieces, won Prix Un Certain Regard at the Cannes Film festival, among others, and were nominated for Palme d’Or at Cannes and several dozen Grand Prix at festivals around the world.

 

In 2019 Sergey Dvortsevoy became a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.