Moscow International Film Festival is one of the oldest in the world. It was first held in 1935, and the chairman of the jury was Sergey Eisenstein. In fact, the chronology of the festival dates back to 1959, when it turned into a regular event. It is important that the rebirth of the MIFF took place in the 60s of the last century - during the “thaw”, when a new generation of directors came to the cinema, whose spiritual experience was formed by the great victory over fascism.

Over the past decades, the popularity of the MIFF and its influence on the world cinema process has increased significantly. Outstanding masters of world cinema, such as Akira Kurosawa and Stanley Kramer, Federico Fellini and Ettore Skola, Andrzej Wajda and Francesco Rosi, Krzysztof Zanussi and Damiano Damiani, Gleb Panfilov and Sergey Gerasimov, Bernard Blie and Alexander Rogozhkin, received this award.

For many years, the director of the Moscow International Film Festival has been the Russian director and actor Nikita Mikhalkov.