In a hospital in Rome, a poor 92-year-old white Russian émigré lies on her deathbed. She reveals to her granddaughter Olga there is a treasure worth 9 billion Italian lire buried "underneath a lion" in Leningrad. However, the story is overheard by the woman's attending physician, two male nurses named Antonio and Giuseppe, a mafioso named Rosario, and a patient with a broken leg. All six of the characters fly to Leningrad to hunt for the treasure.
When flying the mafioso steals the doctor's passport, but then he broke a window, eventually leading to emergency landing. The doctor, without a passport, is forced to make round trips from Russia to Italy since neither country will accept him. Antonio and Giuseppe are soon joined by Andrei, an undercover captain of the Soviet militsiya who poses as a tour guide for Antonio, who purports to grant Antonio free tours on the basis that he is "the millionth Italian visitor". Olga doesn't plan to share her treasure with anyone and runs away, but agrees to join forces with Andrei, while Rosario the mafioso continues his attempts to eliminate the competition. They start digging up lion statues all over Leningrad, which is a city well known for its many lion monuments.
They eventually find the treasure hidden underneath a lion cage at a zoo, but the lion starts chasing them through Leningrad. After making a successful escape they are confronted by the police who confiscate the treasure, which belongs to the state under the Soviet law. Nonetheless, they are awarded 25% of the value of the treasure as a reward for finding it. The now-wealthy adventurers part their ways and return to Italy, but Olga decides to stay with Andrei in the end.
Eldar Ryazanov dreamed of working with Italian filmmakers and in 1970 wrote a pitch for a comedy Spaghetti Russian-style with Emil Braginsky, but Goskino officials didn't like it as they found the Italian characters too stereotypical. Same year Sergei Bondarchuk finished Waterloo co-produced by Mosfilm and Dino De Laurentiis who ended owning Mosfilm a lot of money and suggested to return it by producing a light cheap comedy. This is when Ryazanov and Braginsky were contacted.
They were joined by Franco Castellano and Giuseppe Moccia to finish the script.
Reception
In the Soviet Union the movie was seen by 49.2 million people, becoming one of the leaders of the 1974 Soviet box office.
