Volodya is an aspiring writer from
Siberia. His first short story has just been published in the magazine
Yunost ("Youth"); and a famous author, Voronin, has invited him to Moscow to discuss his work. In the
Moscow Metro Volodya unexpectedly makes a friend, Kolya (
Nikita Mikhalkov), who is returning home after a hard night shift. Volodya wants to stay at his old friends' home, but he doesn't know the exact street so Kolya decides to help him find it. Unfortunately, a dog bites Volodya near
Clean Ponds. Then Kolya decides to help his new friend againthey go to Kolya's home where Kolya's sister sews Volodya's trousers and introduces him to Kolya's large family. Volodya realizes that his old Moscow friends aren't in Moscow anymore (they left for south) and Volodya stays at Kolya's. Then Volodya goes for a walk. At last alone, Kolya decided to sleep, but then came his old friend Sasha (
Yevgeny Steblov). Sasha is in troublehe was planning on marrying his fiancée Sveta today, but he has been called up for military service. He begs Kolya to help him. Kolya helps. Then two young men go to the
GUM department store to buy a suit for a bridegroom and they meet Volodya there (Volody has recently bought a new suit for himself). The friends decide to buy a present for the bride and they go to the music shop, because Kolya is attracted to the saleswoman, Alyona (
Galina Polskikh). Volodya finds himself attracted to Alyona. He makes another attempt to see Voronin and Kolya invites himself along. Sasha and his fiancée Sveta have a spat over the phone. At Voronin’s home, Volodya mistakes a floor polisher for the writer and the floor polisher quickly reads Volodya’s 3-page story and criticizes it for not being true to life. The real Voronin arrives and asks Volodya to help with a literary collection by young Siberian writers. Sasha decides not to get married, cuts off his hair, and rejects the referral, but then shows up at the wedding anyway. Volodya looks for Alyona and, joined by Kolya, runs into her father, who reveals she went to a concert but gets upset about random men trying to woo his daughter. Unhappy with the meeting with Alyona’s father, Volodya lashes out at Kolya and they part. Kolya picks up Alyona from the concert and Volodya arrives as well. Alyona refuses to go to the wedding with Kolya. Kolya pretends he has telepathy to make a man in front of them turn around. He does and sees them staring at him and rushes off. Kolya, Alyona, and Volodya happen upon a show asking for volunteers to form two teams. The team that can draw the best horse in 5 seconds wins. Kolya’s team is faster but loses due to quality. Volodya accuses a man in the audience of being a thief. The man runs off and Volodya and a large portion of the audience, including the man Kolya claimed to use telepathy on, give chase. The “telepathy victim” accuses Volodya of being the thief, and they end up in a police station where the police are completely confused and cannot understand their stories and why they are there. Kolya enlists a passing woman to get on the phone with Alyona’s mother to vouch for her being out late at night with a female friend. Alyona, Kolya, and Volodya wind up at Sasha’s wedding reception only to find out Sasha and Sveta are splitting up because Sveta found out Sasha had cold feet earlier. Volodya dances with Alyona. Kolya watches despondently, then calls Sveta. When she refuses to pick up the phone, Kolya yells across the plaza to her building and the reception dancers below join him to get her attention. She picks up the phone. Kolya puts Sasha on and the couple make up. Alyona and Kolya see Volodya off as he returns to Siberia and then Kolya and Alyona say goodbye to each other. Kolya sings a song as he heads back to work. ==Cast==