The first half of the film puts all these lives before us in their stasis. It opens with a shot through wintry branches of a window where lights come on. Elena wakes, then wakes Vladimir in his room. The apartment is large, with multiple television sets, and a point is made of Vladimir’s electric shaver. At breakfast, in response to his question, Elena tells him that she is going to visit Sergey today. His funding of Sergey thus comes up, along with his objections. She wants money so that Sasha, her grandson, can go to university and avoid the army. Disconsolate, Vladimir says he will think about it.

Elena goes to visit Sergey, and the film details the arduous trip—train, tram, bus, a path through a wood to a distant part of the city (Moscow?). At first we wonder why the director has insisted on these details until we see that this is what the film is—an anatomy of the ways some lives are being lived, that the living of them is the point of the picture.

The visit to Sergey and family is pretty much what we would expect, especially since Elena brings money. What we do not expect is a heart attack. Vladimir visits his high-class gym and has an attack in the pool. Elena goes to a church and buys candles to put before an altar. Then she informs Katya, the daughter, who rather reluctantly goes to the hospital. The scene between her and her father is a gem: the daughter who superficially resents him because, she says, he always cared more for money than for her; the father who knows why she thinks so but adores her. Levels of feeling are subtly dissected.

Soon Vladimir is sent home in the care of Elena, the former nurse. Soon, too, he tells her that he is going to make a will that takes care of her but that gives most of his money to Katya. (Why this man has not already made a will is an unanswered question.) He scribbles some notes for his lawyer who is coming tomorrow. When she hears this, even though she has just been to a church for him, Elena, who is in charge of his pills, overdoses him. She burns his notes. His estate is then settled under Russian law, which benefits Elena.