Beyond the Arctic Circle, through the night city which lights are rarely lit in the windows of empty five-story buildings, Ilya is driving a van filled with rusty scrap metal. Returning home, he composes poetry for his beloved, admires Stalin's tyranny and prepares to move to Moscow in order to escape from the tormenting memories of how his father mercilessly beat him in childhood. But vaccinated from an early age, unpredictable cruelty and total dislike for people become an obstacle for Ilya on the way to a new life.