Two English noblemen of vastly different means -- one a duke, the other an earl -- struggle ineptly with the changes occurring all around them. Their resistance serves only to make their circumstances even more challenging, and they gradually become victims of their own creation. Wives, lovers, and children are also drawn into a maelstrom of folly that leaves no one unscathed. The situation grows increasingly bizarre when a bumbling American high school teacher from Iowa travels to England and decides to build a castle. His misguided efforts soon become the stuff of legend.