Сорок первый

По палящим пескам среднеазиатской пустыни движется, преследуемый белыми, умирая от жажды, отряд красноармейцев во главе с комиссаром Евсюковым. На боевом счету у лучшего стрелка отряда Марютки — сорок убитых белогвардейцев. В последнем бою по захвату каравана взят в плен белый поручик-аристократ Говоруха-Отрок, направленный с дипломатической миссией от Колчака к Деникину. Марютке поручают конвоировать пленного....

In 1919, during the Russian Civil War, a small force of Red Army soldiers that survived a crushing defeat by the White movement is forced to flee into the Karakum Desert. Among them is female sniper Maria, who has already claimed thirty-eight enemies dead. When the unit ambushes a Camel train transporting White soldiers, she kills two of them and tries to shoot their officer, who will be her forty-first, but misses. The man, a lieutenant named Govorukha-Otrok, is carrying a letter from Admiral Aleksandr Kolchak to General Anton Denikin that states he has secret information to be conveyed orally to General Danil Dratsekno. Maria is entrusted with guarding him. Tensions arise between both: the officer is a well-educated aristocrat who is both amused and impressed by the crude attempts of Maria, a fisherman's orphan daughter, to compose Agitprop poetry. When their Bactrian camel are stolen, their commander decides to send his captive on a boat to their headquarters in Kazalinsk via the Aral Sea. The vessel capsizes in a sudden storm, and only Maria and Otrok remain alive, stranded on an isolated island. The Red soldier treats the White officer when he catches a fever and is slowly charmed by his manners, while he is overcome with gratitude and begins to call her 'Man Friday' with affection. When she demands to know what he means, he tells her the story about Robinson Crusoe. The two fall in love and seem to forget about the war.