Mikhail Konstantinovich Kalatozov, born Mikheil Kalatozishvili, was a Soviet film director of Georgian origin who contributed to both Georgian and Russian cinema. He is most well known for his films The Cranes Are Flying and I Am Cuba. In 1969, he was named a People's Artist of the USSR. His film The Cranes Are Flying won the Palme d'Or at the 1958 Cannes Film Festival.

The cinema of Georgia has been noted for its cinematography in Europe. Italian film director Federico Fellini was an admirer of the Georgian film: "Georgian film is a completely unique phenomenon, vivid, philosophically inspiring, very wise, childlike. There is everything that can make me cry and I ought to say that it is not an easy thing."