Solntseva is a Russian actress and director. She became a star of silent films thanks to her leading role as the Martian queen in the Russian SF film Aelita (1924) directed by Yakov Protazanov. Afterwards she starred in the romantic comedy The Cigarette Girl from Moscow, (Papirosnitsa ot Mosselproma, 1924) by Yuri Zhelyabuzhsky and drama Eyes That Saw (Glaza, kotorje videli, 1928) by Vladimir Vilner. In 1929 she married the director Alexandr Dovzhenko and appeared on screen for the last time in his film The Earth (Zemlya, 1930). After that and until Dovzhenko’s death, she worked as his assistant and later co-director. Just before the start of the production of the film Poem of the Sea (Poema o more, 1958), Dovzhenko died and Solntseva decided to realize her husband’s project according to his original vision. The film received the Lenin award and Solntseva posthumously devoted it to her husband. After Poem of the Sea, she made several other of her husband’s unfinished projects: documentary Battle for Soviet Russia (1943/1961), war drama Chronicle of Flaming Years (Povest plamennykh let, 1961), autobiographical The Enchanted Desna (Zacharovannaya desna, 1964) and The Unforgettable (Nezabijvajemoje, 1967), based on Dovzhenko’s war novels. In 1970, she directed a film about Dovzhenko The Golden Crates (Zolotje vorota, 1969), based on his diaries. In 1974 she made a film that has nothing to do with Dovzhenko, Such High Mountains (Takiye vysokiye gory, 1974), which deals with the problems of modern education.