A young girl dreaming to become an actress goes through hell with an orphan baby on her hands. The whole world seems to be against her. She meets the love of her life when there is no one to stand by her.

Policeman Pavel Kravtsov is a rather strange man. If he has to handcuff someone, he apologizes and asks if he is pressing. He is ambitious but honest; he is young but thoughtful. With such inclinations, you can't really make a career in the city police. So a city man, senior Lieutenant Kravtsov, gets through to the remote village of Anisovka by an ordinary district police officer.

The plot is not developed; in the film we see a man (he) and a woman (she) who, in fact, are neither connected nor familiar with each other; they casually met in hospital. "She" (Viktoria Tolstoganova) does not see that she is in danger in connection with her plan to use a tape with illegally made recordings as compromising evidence in court. "He" (Il'ia Shakunov, an actor of the Petersburg TYuZ) is a gay translator who, after the random meeting with her, is pursued by her image which frequently pops up in front of him. As a consequence, his relationship with a young boy no longer satisfies him. Both he and she lose sight of the meaning of life, because of their own inability to see others and to see love, as perception relies on proximity instead of distance.

Each of the short stories is based on either one or several stories by a wonderful Russian writer. The heroes are ordinary people “of the people”, contemporaries of Shukshin, all of whose life’s ups and downs are inextricably linked with their country - the Soviet Union of the 60s-70s. The main thing that unites both the works themselves and the films made is a whole gallery of the brightest images and characters, a story about such different destinies and differently meaningful lives, a story in the center of which is invariably Man, with his love, quests, weaknesses and victories.

The popular TV journalist Sergei Kupriyanov recently became the country's main television personality and began to make his own program. But success, money, and fame cannot fill the void in a marriage relationship. Sergei's wife Irina lacks his love and warmth, and Sergei himself is looking for novelty, which he finds in the arms of his charming colleague Lena when Irina leaves for St. Petersburg.