Where to Watch

Classic overview

The film follows esteemed gynecologist Pavel Kucotsky as he battles illegal abortions and the 1936 ban amid the political upheavals of mid-20th-century Russia— from Lysenkoism to Stalin’s funeral and the Khrushchev thaw—while public opinion casts him alternately as savior or villain. Interwoven are his wife Elena’s memory loss, their daughter’s turbulent coming-of-age, a Buenos Aires inheritance, and the bohemian jazz scene, all culminating in a saga of personal and national transformation.