John, a Maltese student with big dreams and a serious lack of sleep, has had a busy and exhausting last couple of days. It all takes a toll on him during one night whilst driving home from work. His going missing effects a series of coincidental events on a night of tragedy.

I Yam What I Yam...L'invenzione' is centered around the collision of two films originally shot on the same location; Emidio Greco's 'L'invenzione di Morel' (1974) and Robert Altman's 'Popeye' (1980). In Greco's film a shipwrecked man stumbles upon an ultra-modernist mansion. In it he finds a group of people trapped in a perpetual present facilitated by a machine that's capable of reproducing reality. Sant's reinvention of this film is shot on the same location, follows the same storyline, but occupies another world. In place of the mansion, he finds himself in 'Sweethaven' - the set of Altman's 'Popeye'. Though there is no trace of Greco's set, Altman's 'Sweethaven' remains - echoing Greco's plot by existing as an open-air museum where costumed entertainers re-enact scenes.

Set a few decades ago. The serene, even joyful atmosphere, created by Mario Lanza's "Funiculì, Funiculà" and the soft lighting characterize the normal morning routine of a father and his son. This turns into tragedy as the son experiments with his first and last shave.

This is an anti war film where we see a soldier's psychological state deteriorate due to the effects of war. It is not set in any particular time or war as it is meant to represent the soldier's post-combat state of mind.