XVII century, Bulgaria is under Ottoman rule. Four men break into the house of the shepherd Karaivan, raping and killing his wife in full view of their child, Maria. To protect his daughter and to enact revenge, he raises Maria as a son, teaching her to fight and kill. But as Maria grows up, she longs for a different life.
The action centers on Ran and his schoolmates who are in the last year of school. They are only a few days away from the day when they will have to make a decisive choice: what are they going to be, and what is more important, how are they going to live? In the whirlpool of meetings with different people and mainly with three women, the filmmakers are trying to see the future of their main character. His schoolmate Mariana wants to lead him into family life. The pop singer Neli is the very incarnation of adventurism. However, he is most deeply touched by the salesgirl in the near-by coffee shop Tintyava. This is a wordless affair in which each glance exchanged betrays the piercing excitement of impossible love.
Two adolescents, Sauly and Mick, get to know each other while hitchhiking and stick together for the long haul. They both want to reach the ocean, which is some thousand kilometers away. An old car picks them up, but the trip ends shortly thereafter in a sleazy motel. At the bar, a man named Landolfi approaches them. He explains to Sauly that he must have sold his guardian angel to a man by the name of Miller in the city of Prince. Though the boys do not believe in guardian angels, Sauly slowly succumbs to his own fears. He would like to have his guardian angel back again. On their trip, Sauly becomes sick. Mick works on a farm to pay the doctor's bills. Once Sauly is well, they travel farther - until they reach Prince. In this mysterious city, all of the people are named Miller, and once Sauly and Mick finally are at the ocean, they meet Landolfi once more.
In a provincial town comes Elena -young actress. Soon she meets Ivan, who is the same age as her and who works at the construction site. In order to be a part of her world he agrees to pay as stand-in for a movie in which she has a small role. During the premiere, the actor gets all the fame and the stand-in stay unnoticed.
