亨利(米基·洛克 Mickey Rourke 饰)是一位名不见经传的小小作家,久久无法成名的苦闷让他将晚上的时光全部都花费在了酒吧中。陪酒女旺达(费·唐纳薇 Faye Dunaway 饰)是亨利的心头好,她的美貌和热情深深的吸引着后者,尽管亨利明知道旺达和酒保艾迪(弗兰克·史泰龙 Frank Stallone 饰)艾迪之间有着非常暧昧的关系,但他还是无法放弃自己对于旺达的感情。 一次偶然中,亨利邂逅了名为塔利(艾丽丝·克里奇 Alice Krige 饰)的艺术投资人,塔利一眼就相中的了亨利的才华。亨利将塔利当做自己出人头地的踏板,但随着时间的推移,亨利发现自己根本就无法融入塔利所身处的阶层。Henry Chinaski never cared for the American dream, the thought of needing to become 'something' and fit into the system disgusts him. He believes that life is free and yours to live like you see fit, and if that in some cases involves copious amounts of whiskey then so be it. Henry spends his days drinking and listening to the radio, and he spends his nights drinking and fighting against Eddy who he thinks personifies shallowness and shameless self promoting. Sometimes in the middle of this he finds the time to jot down a few lines of poetry or a short story. After fighting Eddy and winning for a change Henry is thrown out of his regular bar where Eddy is a bartender. This leads him to seek another watering hole where he happens to find Wanda who is a barfly, in her own words "if another man came along with a fifth of whiskey, I'd go with him". Henry is not fazed by this thou and moves in with her. Of course Wanda immediately goes off and sleeps with Eddy, but after some clothes throwing and two visits from the paramedics Henry and Wanda manage to patch up their relationship. Then Henry gets a visit from a literary agent who has decided to publish one of his stories that he sent in because he "liked the name of the mag". He follows the agent home to her place in order to receive his payment and with the help of a little whiskey sleeps with her. When he leaves to go back to the bar and back to Wanda the agent is heartbroken, she sees something special in Henry and has fallen in love with him. She follows him to his usual bar and gets into a cat fight with Wanda that Wanda wins. In celebration of new found love, happiness and money Henry buys a round for everyone at the bar and toasts them "to my friends!"