122 minutes
10/29/1978
The action takes place during the Great Patriotic War. Peasant Matryona Bystrova loses her husband at the front, then her eldest son goes missing. Matryona decides to save the youngest son at all costs and shelters him from being drafted into the army in the attic of the house until the end of the war. But it turns out that saving her son, she condemns him to spiritual death, and herself to torment of conscience. A private story about the mother of a deserter grows to epic proportions...
Nonna Mordyukova
as Matryona
Vadim Spiridonov
as Stepan
Andrey Nikolaev
as Mitya
Valentina Telichkina
as Nina
Valeriy Nosik
as Grishka the postman
Vladimir Gusev
as Misha
Galina Mikeladze
as Katya
Arkady Smirnov
as Kornakov
Vera Kuznetsova
as Kornakova
Nikolay Dupak
as chairman
Ivan Ryzhov
as priest
Valentina Ushakova
as Mariya
Irina Korablyova
as Tanya
Nina Agapova
as Faina
Vladimir Basov Ml.
as Petya
Vera Burlakova
as villager
Mariya Vinogradova
as old woman
Lidiya Dranovskaya
as villager
Vladimir Zamanskiy
as military сommissar
Svetlana Zhgun
as villager
Antonina Maksimova
as villager
Vladimir Pitsek
as truck driver
Tamara Yarenko
as villager
Tatyana Tashkova
as Lida
Tatyana Ignatova
as villager (uncredited)
Daniil Netrebin
as district inspector (uncredited)
Yuri Suchkov
as photographer (uncredited)
Vera Blagovidova
as old woman (uncredited)
Tamara Loginova
as Stepan's traveling companion (uncredited)
Tatyana Kuznetsova
as guest at Tanya's wedding (uncredited)
Stanislav Korenev
as secretary
Serhiy Pidhornyi
as Semyonov
Larisa Kronberg
as сельская жительница
Vladimir Isayev