Oleg Gennadyevich Sentsov (Ukrainian: Олег Геннадійович Сенцов, Oleh Hennadiovych Sentsov) is a Ukrainian filmmaker and writer, best known for his 2011 film Gamer. He was arrested in Crimea and convicted to 20 years in jail by Russian court on charges of plotting terrorism acts. The conviction was widely described as fabricated.
Sentsov was born in 1976 in Simferopol, Ukraine. He was an economics student in Kyiv and took courses in film directing and screenwriting in Moscow. His first two short movies were A Perfect Day for Bananafish (2008) and The Horn of a Bull (2009).Gamer, his first feature, debuted at the Rotterdam International Film Festival in 2012. Its success in this and other festivals helped him secure funding for the forthcoming feature Rhino, production on which was postponed due to his work with the Euromaidan protest movement. It was scheduled to begin shooting in the summer of 2014.
After the November 2013 breakout of the Euromaidan protests Sentsov became an activist of "AutoMaidan" and during the 2014 Crimean crisis he helped deliver food and supplies to Ukrainian servicemen trapped in their Crimean bases. Sentsov stated that he did not recognize the Russian annexation of Crimea.
Sentsov has two teenage children.
Sentsov was arrested on 11 May 2014 in Crimea on suspicion of "plotting terrorist acts". With Gennady Afanasyev, Alexei Chirnigo, and Alexander Kolchenko, he became one of four Ukrainian citizens held by Russia's Federal Security Service, who accused them of seeking to carry out terrorist attacks on bridges, power lines, and public monuments in the Crimean cities Simferopol, Yalta, and Sevastopol. These charges are punishable with up to 20 years in prison.