It's a wonderful example of the great Soviet movies shot for the sake of its spectators but not for the regime and its propaganda machine. Even though it does feature some of the latter, it's skillfully incorporated into the thread of the plot and can be considered as rather an indisputable trait of that time: right after the Great Patriotic War the country and its past lie in ruins, and semi-hungry weary people are left with nothing more than aspirations and hopes towards brighter future. Thus, the historical context of Moscow from that period is very natural and believable.
Although its other feature of a slowly unfolding plot might scare some people away, it lets the creators rigorously portray all the details of the detective business from back then. Additionally, it makes the story whole without contradictory bits and pieces.
Finally, it's just pleasantly exciting to watch the main two characters amazingly played by Vysotskiy and Konkin: the ups and downs of their relations, and how they overcome their irreconcilable distinctions and dissents for the sake of justice and their common goal.
The movie is by far the part of that Soviet legacy that the people of the past era are proud of. Adding to that, it is still affecting the cinematography of the modern Russia. Unfortunately, today there are cohorts of low-quality Russian films produced just as petty copies exploiting the ideas of their successor without adding anything new to them.
