Screen adaptation of Dmytro Pavlychko's tale-poem of the same name. The shepherd Vasylko saves his friend, the magical golden-horned deer, from the greedy king and his army.
The film is based on the story "Hunter's Smiles" by writer Ostap Vishnya. Once a year, it would seem, normal, even very respectable people are turning into children who have received a long-awaited toy, or to some kind of "barons of münchhausen". Famous singers, famous surgeons, pensioners, peaceful accountants - all fall into childhood: they store up with waders, dry gunpowder, clean hunting rifles. And from their conversations trembling takes: one tells how he hunted immediately after two bears, the second "sewers" he put like rabbits, the third one shot ten ducks "shot" ... This all means that the hunting season has come!
This film is a romantic story of love between a Hutsul girl and wounded Soviet guerrilla Andrii whom she rescues from certain death. The events unfold against the backdrop of WW2 presented with many obligatory falsehoods of the imperial Russian historiography: heroic Soviet guerrillas, poor and backward Hutsuls, rich Hutsuls betraying their own people and collaborating with the enemy, Ukrainians incapable of their own agency. Crude and mendacious as it is, this ideology is relegated to the narrative background, and the viewer's attention gets quickly captivated by the artistic fortes of the film: riveting stage presence of Kostiantyn Stepankov, Ivan Mykolaichuk, Boryslav Brondukov and the debuting Ivan Havryliuk; gorgeously atmospheric photography of Mykola Kulchytsky, beautiful faces, language, and dress of the Carpathian Ukrainians, and a faithful presentation of Hultsul folk culture devoid of typically condescending Soviet colonial slant.
Based on the Ukrainian vaudeville by Mykhaylo Staritsky, the famous Ukrainian writer. The leading character, Svirid Petrovich Golokhvosty had his own barbershop in town and a reputation of a dandy. Once, after losing everything he had at cards, he decided to remedy his financial situation by a profitable marriage. A rich but ugly girl named Pronya Sirko fell for the illustrious suitor’s courtship...
