In Northern England in the early 1960s, Frank Machin is mean, tough and ambitious enough to become an immediate star in the rugby league team run by local employer Weaver.

General Fitzhugh, an ageing Lothario has an over-active eye for a pretty woman. Despite a long and satisfying career as a seducer extraordinaire, something always seems to get in the way of his bedding the breathtakingly lovely Ghislaine, a more-than-willing town local.