Commissar is a 1967 Soviet film directed by Aleksandr Askoldov based on one of Vasily Grossman's first short stories, "In the Town of Berdychev". Berdychev is centrally located in the north of Ukraine. The action takes place during the Russian Civil War (1918–22), when the Red Army, White Army, Polish and Austrian contingents were battling for territory. Of equal importance is the fact that in Berdychev, at that time, the Yiddish language was officially instated and, from 1924, it had a Ukrainian court of law conducting its affairs in Yiddish. The plot is based upon an intimate intersection of revolutionary and Jewish cultural manners and ideals. The main characters were played by two People's Artists of the USSR, Rolan Bykov and Nonna Mordyukova. It was made at Gorky Film Studio.

Vasily Semyonovich Grossman was a Soviet writer and journalist. Born to a Jewish family in Ukraine, then part of the Russian Empire, Grossman trained as a chemical engineer at Moscow State University, earning the nickname Vasya-khimik because of his diligence as a student. Upon graduation, he took a job in Stalino in the Donets Basin. In the 1930s he changed careers and began writing full-time, publishing a number of short stories and several novels.