The film is based on the eponymous book, written by two former street gangsters - Grigori Belykh and Leonid Panteleyev. Film is set in the 1920s St. Petersburg, Russia. Streets of the city are full of the homeless boys. They are caught to be raised and educated at the correction school named after Dostoevsky. The boys are street smart and difficult. But the faculty stands up to the challenge. The teaches are being devoted and caring, and gradually win the respect of the most difficult kids. The school director Vicknixor is a refined intellectual, who becomes a role model for the boys.
About how Grandfather Gabaday helped Princess Manya and peasant son Gonza to correct their shortcomings.
Two old Leningrad workers, Sukhov and Solyanov, have a long-standing friendship — they worked at the same plant, lived in the neighborhood. Now Solyanov, at the insistence of his son, decides to retire. But it is not so easy to part with his native plant, which, as it turned out, still needs an old personnel officer...
