Moscow, 1930s. A prominent writer's works are suddenly censored by the Soviet state and the premiere of his theatrical play about Pontius Pilate is canceled. He's kicked out of the Soviet Writer's Union, and quickly turns into an outcast with no means to survive. Inspired by Margarita - his lover,...
A young Finnish woman escapes an enigmatic love affair in Moscow by boarding a train to the arctic port of Murmansk. Forced to share the long ride and a tiny sleeping car with a larger than life Russian miner, the unexpected encounter leads the occupants of Compartment No. 6 to face major truths...
Zhenya and Boris are going through a vicious divorce marked by resentment, frustration and recriminations. Already embarking on new lives, each with a new partner, they are impatient to start again, to turn the page – even if it means threatening to abandon their 12-year-old son Alyosha. Until,...
This is a collection of portraits: 23 short stories about the Mari women, a sort of Decameron suspended between magic and realism, in which the Autonomous Republic of the Marij El serves as a backdrop for the collective history of a people of ancient tradition. A journey into a mysterious and...
A local female football team works together to get through hard times and overcome sexual prejudice. Their strength is tested when they lose not only the games, but also their beloved coach who was the core of their team. But they work together to seek financial support, achieve victories, and...
The Humorist is a film about a week in the life of Boris Arkadiev, a fictional Soviet stand-up comedian. Boris is tormented not only by external oppression and censorship but also by his own insecurities that poison all his relationships.
Orléans is a typical provincial Russian town on the banks of a salt lake called Yarovoye. The town is 'steeped in evil'. But it isn't some great evil. This evil is of a banal and everyday type: Lida the hairdresser has indiscriminate affairs, followed by numerous abortions; Rudik the doctor enjoys...
A film almanac consisting of three short stories, each of which tells about the fate of a woman, her hopes for love and the vicissitudes of fate. A village girl Mira dreams of a groom, and now an officer stays in their house for the night, and Mira soon discovers that she is pregnant... Valya, who...
World War II. In autumn 1941 the German troops completely surrounded one of the biggest Russian cities — Leningrad. 2,5 million civilians got trapped in the city. The German commandment decided to destroy the city with bombings, artillery attacks and, most importantly, with hunger. The most...
A fight en route to an airport leads an ordinary Moscow couple to split on a whim. With Nikita ending up in Thailand and Zhenya in Berlin, both find themselves in two separate love triangles, inadvertently causing chaos in others' relationships as they attempt to fix theirs. But even continents...
The unknown actor Lesha works as animator and doesn’t see a chance of success. Lesha doesn’t understand how he is worse than a well-known actor of numerous sensational movies. In complete despair, he notices a girl on the roof of a house and rescues her from jumping, without suspecting that...
The world famous pianist comes home, to the USSR, to participate in the Tchaikovsky Competition. But the commission does not allow him even to the final round. This event becomes fatal for the hero. The heroine of the second story, a young girl, becomes a widow some time after the wedding. Unable...
The comedy melodrama in mockumentary format. Maria is seriously ill preparing for death: chooses a coffin, buys a dress, orders a place in the cemetery. Despite his wife has already reconciled to the destiny, Peter is secretly looking for money to pay for expensive treatment abroad.
Five friends – a poet, an actor, a painter, an architect and a primitivist film director – are five red avant-garde artists who try to find the embodiment of their hopes and dreams in the young Soviet state. The Revolution is boiling up like a bottle with apple cider: winged service dogs and...
Inspired by the words of a random beauty, Slava quits his job as a freight forwarder and his wife Masha, who does not understand him, for the sake of a dream of becoming a professional psychic. The scope of his abilities is dowsing. And now he scans passers-by in the passages, selflessly looking...
Journalists from Moscow, Vika and Alexey, dissatisfied with life, tired of bosses and problems at work, come to the outback to report on the residents of an emergency house, where they face shocking fates of people.
