A 1979 Soviet 5-part television miniseries directed by Stanislav Govorukhin. It achieved the status of a cult film in the USSR, and along with Seventeen Moments of Spring it became a part of popular culture with several generations of russophone TV viewers. The series star the famed singer-songwriter Vladimir Vysotsky in one of his final screen appearances (his untimely death at the age of 42 came less than a year after the film's release). Soviet screen and stage legends Sergey Yursky, Armen Dzhigarkhanyan, Zinovy Gerdt, Yevgeniy Yevstigneyev and Leonid Kuravlev also appear in the film. The film was released in the West as The Age of Mercy, the title of the novel by the writing duo of brothers Arkadiy Vayner and Georgiy Vayner on which the film is based.