Kidnapping, Caucasian Style () is a 1967 Soviet comedy film dealing with a humorous plot revolving around bride kidnapping, an old tradition that used to exist in certain regions of the Northern Caucasus. The film was directed by Leonid Gaidai. It is the last film featuring the trio of the "Coward" (Georgy Vitsin), the "Fool" (Yuri Nikulin), and the "Pro" (Yevgeny Morgunov), a group of bumbling antiheroes similar in some ways to the Three Stooges. The film premiered in Moscow on 1 April 1967. Background As a result of the popularity of the earlier film, Operation Y and Shurik's Other Adventures, Yakov Kostyukovsky and Moris Slobodsky requested Mosfilm to support a new film about the character of Shurik. The screenplay for the new film was initially titled "Shurik in the mountains" and was divided into two parts. The first part, "Prisoner of the Caucasus", was about the student Nina who comes to visit her relatives in the Caucasus and is kidnapped by a local director named Okhokhov. The second part, "Snow Man and Others", was about a scientific expedition seeking the Yeti in a mountainous region, with the Coward, the Fool, and the Pro pretending to be the Yeti by way of hiding from the local militia. In the end, Shurik and Nina were supposed to expose the trio. As the process went forward, it was decided to focus on just the first part of the screenplay. Yuri Nikulin and Evgeny Morgunov initially refused to be part of the film as they felt the screenplay was too unrealistic. In the end, Gaidai convinced both actors to reprise their roles by agreeing to make some adjustments to the screenplay. It also took a long time to cast the role of Nina, with more than 500 screen tests completed before Natalya Varley was selected for the role. Because she worked as a circus tight rope walker prior to acting, she had an easier time with the stunt work and physicality required in the role. On the other hand, her relative lack of acting experience made the dialogue scenes more challenging for her. In the case of the character of Saakhov, there were disagreements between Gaidai and the actor playing Saakhov, Vladimir Etush. While Etush thought Saakhov should be played as an accomplished, intelligent man who takes himself seriously, Gaidai wanted more of an over-the-top performance. During production, the screenplay was also altered