Russian gothic horror adaptated from the Nikolai Gogol folk story about a young theology student, Khoma Brutus (Leonid Kuravlyov), who performs a scripture reading over the body of a young woman who has died. Forced to spend three nights alone with the body, Khoma is forced to use his faith to defend himself after it is revealed that the young woman is really an emissary of the Devil, who tries to tempt Khoma with strange visions of a frightening twilight world.