A barren field somewhere in Russia. This is where she spent her childhood. The woman is haunted by the ghosts of a long-gone age reminding her of once significant words and steps – too big for the little girl she once was and her grandmother.

Gregor and Stephanie are siblings who couldn’t be more different. She jets across the world, living with women. It’s not even worth her while to rent a flat because she is so committed to being on the road and getting away from the narrow confines of home. Her top priority is self-fulfilment. Her brother Gregor, on the other hand, looks for contemplation, steadiness and a vocation in this world. A monastery, in a nutshell. To understand his choice, Stephanie Weimar takes up the camera and accompanies him from his first instructions to the day he makes his final vows with the Steyler Missionaries in the monastery of St. Augustin. How can a person voluntarily submit to obedience, poverty, and chastity – and do without sex his whole life? Her perplexity and anger at a church that condemns homosexuality in the name of God, bans condoms, and bears part of the blame for Aids drive this film and determine its perspective. We share Gregor’s – whose decision is a radical one – doubts and reflections on this road to enlightenment. But it’s the director who learns what real tolerance means. Because the fact is that we are all seekers for meaning.

Cornelia Klauß

With his family at the cottage, an old man withdraws for a moment at the edge of the river for a cigarette. Old memories come back to him, he came here with a girl when he was 13 years old. He wanted to become a man, she only wanted to share a difficult secret. Nobody gets what he wants.