It's 1936 and respected hero of the Bolshevik Revolution, Colonel Segui Kotov, is living an idyllic life in the Russian countryside with his wife Maroussia and daughter Nadia. One glorious summer's day his serenity is interupted by the arrival of the mysterious Dimitri, a former lover of Maroussia who had disappeared from her life ten years earlier. With songs and stories their new guest charms everyone but Kotov soon begins to suspect more sinister motives for his re-appearance. Set against the growing threat of Stalin's regime of terror, Nikita Mikhalkov's poignant, Oscar-winning film lingers in the memory long after viewing.