Mother scolds and exemplifies first one brother, then the other. Brother (1997) Brother 2 (2000)
It's the fall of 1996. Danila Bagrov, returning from the Chechen War, is strolling through his provincial hometown and accidentally disrupts the filming of a music video for the song "Wings" by the band Nautilus Pompilius. He's hauled into police custody for beating up a security guard, but is released after being threatened with a criminal record unless he finds a job. His mother scolds him for getting into a fight and, to avoid repeating his father's criminal fate, advises him to go to St. Petersburg to live with his older brother, Viktor, who is "a big shot there."
Arriving in St. Petersburg and finding his brother missing, Danila wanders around the city and spends the night in an attic. The next day, at the market, he witnesses a conflict between a junk dealer and a racketeer. Having knocked out a racketeer and taken his homemade revolver, Danila meets the man he rescued, an elderly Russian German named Hoffman, a typical urban lumpenproletariat. Hoffman takes Danila to the Smolensk Lutheran Cemetery, to a crypt, where he introduces him to his homeless friends. They share a drink and snack on the homemade pie Danila was bringing for his brother. Afterward, Danila rides a tram and sees two Caucasians, who haven't paid their fare, taunting a timid ticket collector. Threatening them with the revolver he had confiscated earlier, he forces them to pay a fine. The frightened Caucasians hand over their wallet, begging him not to kill them. Danila, having counted out the required amount, throws the wallet on the floor, and the Caucasians, picking it up, run away. Then Danila goes to a rock music store to find a Krylya album, where he meets party girl Kat, who immediately notices his imported player.
Finally, Danila meets his brother, Viktor, a hitman known as Tatarin, who, trying to appear like a respectable businessman to his younger brother, provides him with money, advising him to buy himself some decent clothes and rent a place to stay.
The day before, a gangster nicknamed Krugly, who spouts off original rhymes, ordered Tatarin to kill a crime boss nicknamed Chechen, who had taken over the local market. Tatarin agreed to carry out the job, but demanded more than usual—twenty thousand dollars—citing the risk to his life. This didn't sit well with Kruglyin, who ordered his men to constantly monitor the market and keep an eye on Tatarin. Viktor, complaining to his brother that Chechen, a supposed "former Chechen terrorist," is extorting money from him and harassing Russians, draws Danila into a criminal showdown and gives him a "hit job" on Chechen, promising to pay him two thousand dollars. Danila agrees, but refuses the offer of a pistol for six hundred dollars. [5]
Through Hoffman's friends, Danila also rents a room [6] in the apartment of an elderly alcoholic war veteran. Arriving at the market disguised as a student wearing an old raincoat, beret, and glasses, Danila detonates several homemade explosives to distract people and, taking advantage of the confusion, kills Chechen. However, Krugly's men pursue Danila and manage to wound him. Danila barely escapes pursuit by jumping onto a freight tram and, in a shootout, wounds one of the bandits, who subsequently dies. Tram driver Svetlana offers to help the wounded Danila, but he refuses, promising to find her later and thank her.