Rishat Valiev

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.

At the heart of the plot lies a conflict between a young woman and a bank employee over some hidden clauses in a mortgage deal. The 25-year old young woman is married and works as manager; she is paying off a long-term mortgage. One day she finds out that she has an incurable disease and that her husband, an airline steward, has perished in an air crash. The insurance sum is sufficient to cover the mortgage in one lump sum... An allusion to people trading the best years of their life for an apartment, only in this case the trade is literally between an apartment and life.