Imre Sarkadi

In a rural scenery in the throes of difficult changes lives a humble but promising young farmer girl called Mari Pataki. Her father forbids her from seeing the man she loves. The father, above all preoccupied by work on the fields and prospective wealth, decides to give his daughter in marriage to an old but rich man with whom he does business. Land marries land, he says. This seems to be the unyielding rule of the Hungarian peasantry. But the young lover is ready to stand up to any challenge to keep Maris love.

This drama about a boorish non-conformist takes place in Hungary after the war and is dulled a little by political overtones but is still an engaging story. The setting is the countryside, where an independent, landowning farmer busies himself in his free time by bedding down the women on his farm and then tossing them aside. One such ill-treated lass ends up marrying a young man who is in charge of a communal farm, a farm the womanizing "beast" of the title is later forced to join. The arrogant, formerly independent farmer does not reform his ways and is soon chasing after the young manager's wife, the woman he dropped not that long ago. The results are disastrous.

​A young doctor named Zoltán flees Budapest for his father’s rural estate after performing an illegal abortion on his lover that results in her death. While hiding in the countryside, he attempts to grapple with his guilt and the moral weight of his actions while reconnecting with his estranged family. His isolation is interrupted by a burgeoning relationship with a local woman, Mira, which forces him to choose between permanent escape or facing legal and ethical accountability.

The heroine of the TV movie based on Imre Sarkadi's short novel is a coward to accept the duties, struggles and struggles of everyday life. Giving up her desires and plans, she floats aimlessly in her luxurious surroundings, in the hated company of the famous artist husband. His willpower is only for pointless heroics. He is incapable even of the sincere and profound love that gives hope of a meaningful and happy life.

On the shores of Lake Balaton, a group of people rush to their boats as a storm approaches, notice that a boat has capsized on the water and go to the rescue. They rescue a couple, and the young man who rescues them falls in love with the woman.