A love triangle unfolds on a pilgrimage tour. “Does devil send the woman when no other weapon left?” – wonders the protagonist. An intimate portrait of three, living between the sky and the earth.
For almost 600 years every early June pilgrims from all parts of Russia walk in a religious procession from the town of Vyatka to the village of Velikoretskoe to the place of appearance of a wonder-working icon of Saint Nicholas. Overcoming physical difficulties and other challenges, thousands of people in today’s Russia join the pilgrimage, each searching for answers to difficult, sometimes seemingly unsolvable questions. From the flow of masses the camera attentively catches individual faces and destinies – a priest, an ex-teacher, and a factory worker among others share their daily worries and hopes for the future. The film’s central protagonists – Anatolii, Maria and Alyona – are facing difficult choices locked in a painful love triangle. Thinking of heaven and living on earth, they are torn between contradictory desires, afraid of making a fatal mistake, unwilling to lie or betray. Everyone has hard decisions to make. The use of flashbacks rare in a documentary helps reconstructing their evolving relationship adding intimate depth to the “road romance” portrayed with unique sincerity and tact.
An important moment has come for the characters of the film, when they should take the main decision of their lives. And they cannot make a mistake, they cannot lie to themselves. They can not postpone anything.
