Renowned oceanographer Steve Zissou has sworn vengeance upon the rare shark that devoured a member of his crew. In addition to his regular team, he is joined on his boat by Ned, a man who believes Zissou to be his father, and Jane, a journalist pregnant by a married man. They travel the sea, all too often running into pirates and, perhaps more traumatically, various figures from Zissou's past, including his estranged wife, Eleanor.

This coarse bedroom farce takes place at the St. Moritz ski resort over a Christmas vacation. Among the couples whose lives intersect are a widowed artist honeymooning with his second wife, a gay man traveling with his son and his lover (and hiding each from the other), a snobbish couple from Milan who have been forced to share a suite with a pair of crass Romans, etc.