In London, 1938, Ian Fleming is a dissolute playboy, eclipsed by his dead war hero father and successful brother. While propping up the bar at a jazz club, he meets Ann O'Neill, an alluring socialite. Unlike many of his conquests, Ann is more than a match for him. She already has a husband and a lover, Esmond Rothermere. Fleming finds solace in the arms of a beautiful dispatch rider named Muriel. Following a frosty morning-after encounter with Muriel, Fleming's domineering mother secures him a job assisting Naval Intelligence's Admiral John Godfrey. He quickly incurs Godfrey's wrath when he cooks up an unorthodox scheme to get information from two captured German submariners. However, Fleming's valuable findings make it apparent that an imaginative approach could be just what the war effort requires.