Uzala

Uzala commonly refers to Dersu Uzala, a hunter and guide of the indigenous Udege people who accompanied the Russian explorer Vladimir Arsenyev on expeditions in the Sikhote-Alin region of the Russian Far East in the early 20th century. Arsenyev's memoirs and travelogues, first published in the 1920s, brought Dersu Uzala's story to a broader audience.

In 1975, Akira Kurosawa directed the film Dersu Uzala, based on Arsenyev's accounts of his friendship with Dersu Uzala. The Soviet-Japanese co-production won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film at the 48th Academy Awards, making it Kurosawa's only Oscar win in that category. The film is noted for its landscapes and its portrayal of cultural exchange between a Russian explorer and a local hunter.

Beyond the film and Arsenyev's writings, Uzala is primarily encountered as a literary and cinematic reference to Dersu Uzala; the original travelogues and Kurosawa's adaptation have shaped popular understanding of the Dersu Uzala figure and the history of exploration in Siberia and the Russian Far East.