Trivia / Sannikov Land

• Science Marches On: There is no Sannikov Land. Doesn't stop the story from being good though.
• Troubled Production: Mkrtchyan and Popov basically threw the original book from the window (Mkrtchyan basically wrote a completely new script together with a famous director Mark Zakharov), their original choice for the lead (Vladimir Vysotsky) got caught in the Soviet politics at the time and became blacklisted, the directors being inexperienced, they antagonized the filming crew, especially the main trio of Vladislav Dvorzhetsky, Oleg Dahl and Sergey Shakurov, who entered a strike, and while Dvorzhetsky and Dahl were later persuaded to continue filming, Shakurov was later thrown out.
• What Could Have Been: Vladimir Vysotsky wanted to play the leading role. He even wrote five original songs for the film.