Nikita seems to be a popular Russian name. But is it male or female? And how is it be correctly spelled?

It’s male name

Yeah, it’s a male name in Russia. The second syllable is stressed (NikIta).

But in Elton John’s video called “Nikita” there is a Russian military woman. And Nikita seems to be her name in this song.

Well it’s no wonder… minding Elton John’s sexual preferences
The song itself might be about a man (apparently Russian) but he films a woman in a video

What about the film La Femme Nikita then? It’s about a woman. ‘Femme’ is ‘woman’ in French.

In Russia and other ex-Soviet countries Nikita refers to men and boys only.
But this name is more or less spread all over the world (in Europe at least). And out there Nikita is a rather unisex name.

In recent times it has been adopted as female in many countries around the world, particularly France. The male Russian name is derived from the Greek name Aniketos, which means “unconquerable”. (Wikipedia)

And it’s also a town in Ukraine )))

As for Elton John’s video:

The video for the song “Nikita”, directed by Ken Russell, featured Anya Major in the role of Nikita. Russell says he didn’t realise that Nikita was a man’s name in the Russian language and Elton John accepted the proposed script written by Russell which was a male-female love interpretation of the song, as indeed the depicted GDR border guard in the video is a beautiful blonde woman with short hair. In interviews John admitted that Nikita was a male name in Russian, hinting at the song’s homosexual view point.

Nikita is a male name in Russia. But in other countries it can be female as well. It is spelled [ni`kita]. The patronymic is Nikitich or Nikitichna (Никитич/Никитична). And yes, it really is quite popular, but not as much as Sasha, Dima, Vova, Aliosha.