In 1880s New York City, newspapers were engaged in a free-for-all competition, with the respectable practitioners such as Joseph Pulitzer leading a horde of sheets that included every kind of yellow rag imaginable. Newspaperman Phineas Mitchell (Gene Evans) is so appalled by the brand of journalism practiced by The Star, the newspaper where he works, and its publisher, Charity Hackett (Mary Welch), that he gets himself fired. But instead of looking for another job, he decides to start up his find out more...

It's the off-season at the lonely Beauregard Hotel in Bournemoth, and only the long-term tenants are still in residence. Life is stirred up, however, when the beautiful Ann Shankland arrives to see her alcoholic ex-husband, John Malcolm, who is secretly engaged to Pat Cooper, the woman who runs the hotel. Meanwhile, snobbish Mrs Railton-Bell discovers that the kindly if rather doddering Major Pollock, played by David Niven, who won an Oscar for his performance, a retired officer who likes to find out more...