The story about a difficult post-war time. About destiny of the young lieutenant and the young girl, whose love passes through the hardest vital and moral ordeals.
During the final winter of WWII, as displaced persons return to their former homes in the Soviet Union, an 8-year-old boy is left alone when his mother dies en route.
Olga Voznesenskaya is a silent screen star whose pictures are so popular that underground revolutionaries risk capture to see them. She's in southern Russia filming a tear-jerker as the Bolsheviks get closer to Moscow. Although married, she spends time every day with Victor Pototsky, the film's cameraman. Gradually, it comes to light that Victor uses his job as a cover for filming White atrocities and Red heroism: he's a Bolshevik. He asks her for help, and she discovers meaning in her otherwise flighty and self-centred life. Love blooms. Will the Red forces arrive in time to save them from a suspicious White military leader? Will she find courage?
Despite the restoration of Soviet power in the area, Basmachis continue to arrive from across the border, bringing death and destruction to peaceful villages. One of the bands of rebels is led by Khairulla who is pitted against the militsiya (local militia) leader Maxumov. At first it seems hopeless for Maxumov as the rebels capture most of his men, winning them over to his side. He has only one strategy left; to give himself up, and try to explain to the people that Khairulla has deceived them, turning the soldiers back to revolution. Later in pursuit of his enemy, he chases Khairulla across a river. He has only one bullet left -- the seventh, and he must not miss his target!
