Set in turn-of-the-20th-century Transylvania, at the snowy hillside manor of a blithe aristocrat named Nikolai (Frédéric Schulz-Richard), the film follows for nearly the entirety of its 200 minutes a series of winding conversations between a group of bourgeois elite—among them a Russian general's wife (Diana Sakalauskaité), a devout young Christian girl (Marina Palii), a Franco-Russian nobleman (Ugo Broussot), and a middle-aged woman (Agathe Bosch) whose pessimistic worldview seems to embody the essence of Solovyov's book.[2]
The conversations always return to a central topic: whether one should adopt a non-violent approach to the organisation of society (Tolstoy's attitude, which Solovyov abhorred), or approach the duty of fighting war in a fervently committed, Christian spirit.[3]
