The Gardener

An almanac of short feature films based on stories by Mikhail Mishin from the collection of short stories "Pause in a Major".

Лента рассказывает о реальных событиях конца февраля 2000 года, произошедших в Аргунском ущелье в Чечне. Бойцы 6-й роты 104 парашютно-десантного полка Псковской дивизии ВДВ вступили в жестокий бой с двадцатикратно превосходящими силами террористов. Десантники не дрогнули, не отступили и выполнили задание, ценой своей жизни преградив путь бандитам, прорывающимся из окружения.

The story follows Maria Konovalova who travels from her rural village to visit her daughter Nina in the city. Maria's arrival exposes the stark contrasts between rural and urban lifestyles and reveals deep-seated family tensions. Interestingly, Родня (Rodnya) in Russian sounds very similar to the word Родина (Rodina), which means "Motherland." The film features three generations of women — Maria, her daughter Nina, and her granddaughter Irina — symbolizing three different Russias: one from the past, one modern, and one representing the future.

At the airport, two old friends meet. One is a physical education teacher at a rural school, the other is the manager of a metropolitan basketball team. They have plenty of memories to share and things to talk about...

The first secretary of the regional committee, Makhonin, sums up after the meeting of the party's general secretary with the regional economic and party activists. At the same time, he reports to those who allowed themselves critical speeches at this meeting. Central television accidentally records this “debriefing”, finding the material interesting send the film to Moscow by plane. Makhonin finds out about this and, frightened of the consequences, decides to return the plane and destroy the film at all costs...

Lyudmila Gurchenko's brilliant performance in a musical drama about a life of the struggling singer.

Two men at a country dacha are having an intimate conversation about life and love. And then She appears.

When the war began, graduates of the choreographic school decided to make their way to the front. Young ballerinas Alka and Nadia also dreamed of exploits, but instead they were waiting for routine work as nurses in the hospital. The girls still achieved their goal and got to the front line, where Nadia died at the first shelling. After recovering from a severe concussion, Alka again went to the front line, to the Marine reconnaissance platoon. She received her first task – to get a "tongue"…