Dusha is a young dancer and dance instructor. Torn between a dominant mother, an absent father and a married lover, she is sinking into a typical crisis of the thirties, which gets worse when she starts suspecting that someone has been following her and invading her privacy. She grows increasingly lonesome and exhausted.
Even more so, as she realises that her relationship with her married lover has no future. He only shows up every now and then, and his affections seem less sincere. Dusha becomes so lonesome and low-spirited, that she develops a habit of confiding in an anonymous but kind and rather interesting astrologer, who runs a commercial line.
Eventually, Dusha matures and makes a decision – she leaves her negligent lover, even though she is carrying his baby. Even her overly self-confident and sexually vibrant mother is preparing for the role of a loving grandmother. This positive change was actually triggered by someone who has been secretly coming beneath Dusha's window for quite a while. Her secret admirer, whom she first regarded as a potential danger and a distasteful voyeur, gradually finds a way to her heart and restores her confidence in the love of a man, and convinces her that there is life after youth, a meaningful life. The unusual admirer does not bring a happy ending, nor an ending of any kind, but offers Dusha a chance to rethink her attitudes toward life and make a fresh start. He tells her a story of a pair of storks, a white female and a black male. It is a tale of love that may or may not exist, but regardless of that, there is no life without it.
Dusha realizes that male emotions are too unreliable. She decides to keep the baby, stay friends with her two male friends, and live the life of a single mother.
»With birds, it is all instinct, even faithfulness. Instincts are okay... Nature has got it all sorted out... While Man is overflowing with words of love and affections and God knows what else. Then he leaves his young in the name of love. Does he take care of his own? Like hell he does! He sells cars, using pretty girls to promote his business!« (Monologue from the film)
What do love and procreation have in common? Birds have it all figured out, but we, humans, will wander in darkness for years to come. And each of us will be able to tell his own story, write his own book, or make his own movie on the subject.
By rule, screenplays have long and desperately exhausting prenatal phases. This one, too, has been born only after years of almost pathological pregnancy. Each director lets out a loud sigh of relief when the screenplay leaves the hands of the Readers and is placed in the hands of the Actors. Namely, that is the moment when the game truly starts, when the cards are dealt. When it becomes real, serious and exciting. Then is the time for you to gamble. The written words are being read by a hundred people at once, and they all have to believe in them, they all have to understand each other, think the same, do the same. It is terrible. And terrific.
Metod Pevec