A young mother has been forced to flee her home carrying her husband's aged mother on her back. The old woman cannot walk. In addition, there are three small children to care for. There is no food in the middle of winter in the Bosnian mountains. Somehow she must get through the isolated mountain pass to a safe village. She cannot carry the old woman and the two smallest children as well. The young woman is faced with a terrible choice - either she sacrifices the old woman, or her children will die. We see that the old woman realizes this herself, and indicates to the daughter-in-law that she accepts her fate. The young woman then drowns the old woman in a mountain stream. The last image of the film is hopeful. We see the young woman, now carrying the children, arriving at a village. She knocks on the door of a house.