In communist Ukraine, a canning engineer named Daniil Blinov visits his local city hall to report a heating problem in his building, where he lives with thirteen other relatives, in-laws, and housemates—only to learn that his building doesn’t exist in the city registry. When Daniil returns to his apartment and tells his family that the building doesn’t exist, his Aunt Lena confirms this information. She informs him that a group of retired pensioners told her that only two buildings were supposed to be built on their block; a third building, their apartment, was built because there were enough leftover materials. Daniil is assigned by his superior at the cannery to design a method for fitting more food into each can. Daniil completes a report on the problems of stringbean packing. On his way to the cannery offices, Daniil is approached by one of the retired pensioners who sits outside the apartment building. The man tells him that many people in the neighborhood are waiting for Daniil’s building to collapse. Daniil goes to the city council again to complain about the heating problem; the staffer rebuffs him. When Daniil returns home, his grandfather takes out his life savings and awards it to all of the family. The family buys a heater, which is almost immediately accidentally crushed by two people transporting a deceased resident in a coffin during a blackout. In the midst of the chaos, a frustrated Daniil throws the heater over the balcony. His grandfather makes him go pick it up so that it can be fixed. Daniil goes downstairs to the street with his uncle’s mallet and chisel. He begins to chip away at the building’s walls, in hopes that the city officials will see that the building exists.