[3][4] Jan Dítě has been released from a Czech prison three months before the end of his 15-year sentence and is settling in a town near the border between Czechoslovakia and Germany.

He occupies his time by rebuilding a deserted house, and begins to recall his past, saying his main wish in life was to become a millionaire.

Jan begins his career as a frankfurter vendor at a railroad station, and quickly learns the power of money and the influence it exerts on people.

Eventually Jan finds employment in Prague at the Hotel Paříž, where he falls under the tutelage of the Maître d', Skřivánek, who claims that he once served the King of England [sic].

With the Third Reich's annexation of Czechoslovakia, Jan falls in love with Liza, a young Sudeten German woman who worships Adolf Hitler.

During World War II, Jan works in an institute, formerly the Hotel Tichota, where German women reside to breed a new "master race" with selected soldiers.

As the war progresses and the tide turns against Germany, the women are displaced from the facility, and wounded and amputee soldiers replace them.

The website's critical consensus reads, "With charm and an eye for life's bittersweet moments, Czech New Wave master Jiri Menzel paints a picaresque story with whimsy and intellect.