Fifteen years later, Viișoara has not changed much: the shepherd remains the same lonely character, Varvara the same energetic woman caught in complicated administrative tasks, Toderaș with his palinca hidden in the barn and his fading authority, elders wise and active, young people enthusiastic—but not all of them.

Two friends, closer than brothers, working together, staying in the same room, playing together.

A border town on the Danube, 1944. The town is occupied by the Germans, and there are plenty of collaborators. A number of the young men join the partisans, kill a Serbian, and throw his body into the village, forbidding anyone to bury it. Anastasia refuses to obey the order…