Plot synopsis: In the 1920-30s, 70% of the indigenous population died from the Great Famine created by the Bolsheviks in Kazakhstan. Overcoming the dreadful fear of death and despair, an eagle hunter's family from a Kazakh village in the highlands is trying to stay alive in the midst of the fierce winter and face a moral choice, to die as human beings or to survive at any cost, transgressing the human decency.