Kheifets was born 17 December 1905 in Minsk. In 1927 he graduated from the Leningrad Technical-screen art, and in 1928 - cinema faculty of Institute of History of Art. In 1928, Iosif Kheifets came to work at the film studio "Sovkino". In film, he first made his debut as a screenwriter, with Aleksandr Ivanov and Aleksandr Zarkhi he created the scripts for films "Moon on the left" and "Transportation of fire". Then, Iosif Kheifits became a director, while from 1928 to 1950 he worked with Alexander Zarkhi, headed the 1st Komsomol stage brigade of the Leningrad factory "Sovkino", releasing films on the Soviet youth- "Wind in the face", "Noon", the comedy "Hectic Days". "Baltic Deputy", with deep historical and psychological truth, great artistic power, showed how great Russian scientist Professor Polezhayev joined October revolution. A significant piece of cinema became "Member of the Government", film centered on the image of a Russian peasant woman, who took the difficult path from a farmhand to a deputy of the Supreme Soviet. Together with Zarkhi he set such films as "His name is Sukhebaator", "Malakhov Kurgan", the documentary "The defeat of Japan". In 1950s he directed such famous films as "A Big Family", "Rumyantsev Case", "My dear man". Then Iosif Kheifits turned towards the Russian classics, filmed works of Anton Chekhov, Ivan Turgenev, Aleksandr Kuprin - "Lady with the Dog", "Good bad man", "Asya", "Shurochka". In 1970 his film Hail, Mary! entered the 7th Moscow International Film Festival. In 1975 he was a member of the jury at the 9th Moscow International Film Festival. Deep disclosure of the inner nature of characters, fine understanding of cinematic language and expressive details cab be listed as distinctive features of his work. His films brightly and und unexpectedly opened creative individualities of may actors, such as Iya Savvina, Alexei Batalov, Anatoly Papanov, Oleg Dal, Vladimir Vysotsky, Lyudmila Maksakova, Ada Rogovtseva, Elena Koreneva, Stanislav Sadalskiy. Many times the director's work were honored with various film awards, including Cannes Film Festival. Last work of Heifits was dramatic film 'Vagrant Bus", which was released in 1989. Iosif Kheifits died 24 April 1995. He was buried at the cemetery in Komarovo.
