Vienna, 1957: Head waiters Gustav (Paul Hörbiger) and Franz (Hans Moser) are working for the stinted Cafétier Panigl and are close friiends despite of their different characters. Franz is happily married and a good family father, Gustav, a relaxed charmer, is living a calm single life. Overnight both of them become jobless, because Panigl decided to sell his Café which was not successful anymore. Right in this moment, Franz' brother is sending 20.000 Dollar from USA. Money, he once peculated and now wants to pay back.. Gustav and Franz are buying half of the Café for each from the unexpected money. One half they develop as the modern Musicbox-Espresso «Pinguin», the other half as a traditional old style Vienna Café . Misunderstandings between guests and generations are inevitable and stretch the long term friendship of the two waiters.
An Englishman has been working in the US so long he now speaks with an American accent. He is drafted into the British Army during WWII but is injured and loses his memory. Because he talks like an American, the doctors repatriate him to the States where he is housed with a New York family. After the war they all travel throughout Europe, searching for the women he still remembers in the hope of restoring his lost memory
El ponche del director Helmut Weiss se basa en la novela homónima de Heinrich Spoerl y Hans Reimann que se ha convertido en una película alemana de culto. La película cuenta la historia de un escritor, Johannes Pfeiffer, que se infiltra como estudiante en una escuela secundaria después de que sus amigos le dijeran que se había perdido una gran experiencia de vida desde que fue educado en casa.
