Karl Hirnschall is in his thirties and is a member of a Viennese avant-garde theatre group in the early seventies. When he is finally fed up with acting for low fees, he goes back to his former life. He becomes the "right man" for a grocery firm whose products he sells with great success. The neo-salesman manages to acquire a furnished appartment for himself and his young girlfriend, Traude. When his income does not keep pace with his expenditures, Karl resorts to shady business deals.

Two female members of the Soviet military are supposed to kidnap the new American secret weapon at a disarmament conference. The highlight is the duel between Curd Jürgens and Lilli Palmer with vodka in a diplomatic back room. The stopover on the way to freedom is the editorial office of the large Warner publishing house in the USA. The film ends with a wedding in the context of international understanding.

Karl Bockerer is a Viennese original. He survives the ‘great times’ – to his own dismay his birthday is on the same day as the one of the “Führer” – by pretending to be more stupid than he really is, and uncovers, over and over again, the hypocrisy and the uptightness of the epic nonsense in his milieu by means of real and phony naivety. Where Schweijk made a mockery of the ruling system by being a presumptive follower, the Viennese butcher strives against the tide. And he is not alone, has family and friends. His personal braveness protects him neither from the rebellion in his own house, nor from the horrors of total war…