"The subjects switched by the machine are the notorious Ivan the Terrible and his look-alike, an anal-retentive building superintendent Ivan Vasilievich Bunsha (both played by Yakovlev, alternating between alpha and beta male personalities with moderation). So in the present day, Ivan the Terrible gets to acquaint himself with mod cons and a modern world four centuries after his time, not that the film allows him to go out of the main building where lives the scientist Shurik (Demyanenko, indeed a variation on Jerry Lewis's nerdy persona, but less objectionable). An encounter with Shurik's wife Zinaida (Seleznyova) and her lover, film director Yakin (a smarmy and incredulous Pugovkin) reassures him that his repute doesn't lost on posterity."
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