A Young Doctor's Notebook

A doctor finds his old diary while answering to the authorities about self-prescribing morphine. He has a series of comic exchanges with his young and inexperienced self, mocking him for his youthful looks and guiding him through his early difficulties on the job.

In spite of his success in the operating room, life in the snow-bound hospital begins to take its toll on the young doctor. His efforts to combat his feelings of boredom and isolation are defeated and he wonders how much longer he can last. Nursing abdominal pains and two harrowing cases, the young doctor is tempted by the allure of morphine...

It is 1918 and as the Civil War rages through Russia, quiet Mureyvos Young Doctor is more concerned with hiding his growing morphine addiction from an inspection.

Pelageya is sick with either malaria or typhus as the Young Doctor becomes more fixated with Natasha.