Based on the short story by Leonid Andreev "Ivan Ivanovich". A Perestroika look at the events that took place after the 1905 Revolution. The young defender of the barricades shows weakness and releases the captured gendarme. After a while, he is not spared in a similar situation.

The main character, nineteen-year-old Anastasiy Chizhov, was appointed commander of the Zver patrol ship. Under his leadership, the old fishing vessel becomes a strong fighting unit.

One day, a girl sits in the car of the director of a large plant, Pyotr Semenovich Polyakov, calls herself Varya and shows the found father a photo of her mother. And now, in search of the lost, the director comes to the city where he once loved Varina's mother, Zinaida...

A fatal surgical mistake involving the wrong blood type splits the lives of twin brothers. One, the guilt-ridden surgeon, embraces anonymity as a kerosene salesman, while his sibling ascends to become the powerful Chairman of the City Council. When a government investigation into bribery begins, the brothers are finally forced to confront the dark secret that binds them.

Senior ship engineer Valentin Kravchuk brings his son to the Kuban to his aunt to go with his wife to rest in the south. In the evening, at the table, he argues with fellow villagers that he alone will be able to grind two hundred tons of bread. In excitement, he sacrifices the resort and remains at the harvesting shop to prove that he is a warrior in the field - even alone.

A new coach appears in the team - and after a while the hockey players get the long-awaited success. But the tough methodology of the coach changes the moral climate in the team. Krynin, the captain of the team, stands up to defend the dignity of the players and in a difficult confrontation with the coach wins the victory.

Colleagues consider architect Nesterov not a bad man and a specialist, but his wife - a loser. Having accepted her point of view, he withdrew from active life. One day Nesterov is assigned to save the project and sent on a long business trip to the town where he spent his childhood and youth. Nesterov's work is highly praised, and now he is offered to become the chief architect of this town.

Alexander Ivanovich Kirpikov is very popular in his village: only he has a horse, and everyone has vegetable gardens that need to be cultivated. So the villagers are trying to "respect" Kirpikov. But one day, the hardened body of a folk craftsman fails. After another binge, Kirpikov got so sick that he decided to stop drinking out of fright...

The film is set during the last summer before the Great Patriotic War. Three sisters are coming to stay with their grandmother in the village. They imagine the world as a vast and charming "Garden of desires" and all members of the household are waiting for Asya's birthday. Asya has a sense of foreboding regarding the impending grief. Guests come to visit but none of them are her parents. She still does not know that her father was declared an enemy of the people, that tomorrow she will not see her mother and that the war is approaching.