The films hero is a metal worker named Ignat who is as strong and tough as the steel that his sprawling factory produces in the Ural Mountains. Its a great cheerless environment; life is arduous and dangerous; conditions at the plant are nearly subhuman. The only excitement in the grimy industrial town is provided by robbing a train at gunpoint or stealing sheep from the Bashkiri tribe. The most renowned diversion, however, is the annual fist fight between the strongest metal worker and the strongest miner from the region. Against his better judgment, but with the support of his co-workers, Ignat decides to take part in this perilous venture.
Film exposes the corruption and the decadence of the late Soviet bureaucracy in Azerbaijan SSR through the eyes of a naive Azerbaijani adult man, Hatem.
Moscow outskirts, spring 1956. In memory and soul of the sixteen-year-old hero of the movie, the son of the political prisoner, this time will remain forever. He meets and loses his first love, encounters with blunt brutality of the criminal world, to bid farewell to childhood, to regain his father...
