1942. Owing to a stolen mink coat, Süti, the young poet and journalist, gets acquainted with Katalin, the idolated singer. Before being drafted to labour service, he shows the actress the song he composed for her, entitled Smouldering Cigarette.
The film has a broken meaning, the last time he was a proofreader for a book publisher, he is now unemployed. Ever since he was a child, he has always been the one who pulls the short one, and he takes the wrong one. At the beginning of the film, he finds himself in such a "bunbak" situation again, and then he decides to become a professional bunbak...
At a dusty crossroads in the Soviet Union villagers surrender their possessions - a horse, a samovar, a goat - to the state. The train which takes them away brings to the village a physically and mentally handicapped woman, barely able to speak. She makes herself bracelets of burrs and studies herself in a cracked and cloudy mirror. Befriended by very few, teased and tormented by many she seeks protection at a huge portrait of Stalin.
Eckermann (Laszlo Kistamas) is a listless computer whiz who spends most of his time lounging in a bathtub holding imaginary conversations with cartoon characters usually more popular with children than grownups. He has some friends who want to use his skills to steal some money from a local gambling joint. He works out a scheme for his friends and returns to his tub. At some point along the way, he is joined in the water by a lovely Czech refugee, who (perhaps inadvertently) makes it possible for him to die there.