During a routine patrol, a reporter is given permission to interview a hardened cold-war warrior and captain of the American destroyer USS Bedford. The reporter gets more than he bargained for when the Bedford discovers a Soviet sub and the captain begins a relentless pursuit, pushing his crew to breaking point.

A young private with a pistol deals with the aftershock of the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Heironymus Merkin is an internationally successful singer approaching middle age who retells his life story in a series of production numbers on a seashore in front of his two toddlers and aged mother. Merkin's promiscuous relationships with women are explored, particularly Polyester Poontang and the adolescent Mercy Humppe. Merkin is constantly surrounded by a Satan-like procurer, Goodtime Eddie Filth, and an angelic 'Presence' who interrupts Merkin's biography with cryptic Borscht Belt-level jokes to denote births and deaths in Merkin's life. Newley periodically steps out of character to complain about his 'Merkin' role with an unseen director, two screenwriters, the film's producers and a trio of blasé movie critics who are turned off by the story's eroticism and lack of plot.

Master Sgt. Albert Callan is a war hero and a no-nonsense leader who reforms his previously mismanaged military base. Although Callan seems collected, he struggles as a closeted homosexual. When the sergeant becomes obsessed with his handsome clerk, Tom Swanson, he even disrupts the young man's relationship with his French girlfriend, Solange. Since Swanson isn't receptive to Callan's advances, it creates major tension between the two men.

A burned-out private detective in Las Vegas gets involved in blackmail and murder.

A Russian countess stows away in the stateroom of a married U.S. diplomat bound for New York.