Russian film director and TV presenter Yekaterina Gracheva introduced her new documentary film, “After Father to Antarctica” in Paris.

       The European premiere of the film, which tells about the history of Russian exploration of Antarctica, took place on Saturday night at the Russian Film Festival in Paris. It was part of a program dedicated to global environmental and climate issues.

      "If Mikhail Lazarev and Thaddeus Bellingshausen discovered the Antarctic for the whole world, then the first Russians who set foot on the continent were the members of the Soviet Antarctic expedition of 1955-1957," - the filmmaker pointed out.

      The first to step on the ice of Antarctica in that expedition was Igor Grachev, 27, an engineer and inventor. The polar explorer’s archive consists of over 2500 slides and negatives, about a dozen photo albums, diaries, letters and radiograms. It became the basis of his daughter’s film.