To earn money for married life, a young engaged man takes a job as an engineer on a privately operated oil drilling rig in the far North of Russia. A friend's letter brings the sad news that his fiancée has already married someone else and in desperation he quits his job and flies back to Moscow. There all his vast efforts to win her back seem in vain...
A young Russian store clerk has a drab existence in times of shortages and is berated by her ailing mother for not seeing men. So she brings home an unknown young man who she met on the tram. She dreams many things but pines for this man.
An exploration of 20th century Russia, following the fusing of the Party and the state after the Russian Civil War, which opened the doors to corruption, resulting in the exiling of the left and right opposition. Described using a combination of historical settings, biographies and masterpieces from Russian avant-garde artists, composers and writers from this period in history.
