Michael "Mick" Marler, Nicol Williamson, is a high-ranking corporate executive who has risen to the top despite a working-class background. One morning, while he is trying to save his boss, Hazlitt, Paul Rogers from a string of costly mistakes and sagging sales, Mick convinces him to push the company to embrace computers, overturning a board rejection. After Hazlitt agrees, Mick’s wife Rosemary, Ann Bell, calls to tell him that his father, John Joe, is dying. Mick wants to walk away, but Hazlitt pressures him to finish a crucial report. He then drives his Jaguar to his childhood neighborhood in Liverpool.
Mick is devastated to learn that his father has already died, and he is shaken by dark bruises on the father’s face and body. After questioning everyone at the house, Mick seeks answers from Cocky Burke, J.G. Devlin, his father’s close friend, who explains that John Joe, a beloved amateur balladeer, suffered a heart attack after a violent confrontation with English youths who attacked him for singing an Irish rebel song. Mick asks Cocky to go to the police, but Cocky, who distrusts authorities, urges Mick to seek his own form of justice. When Mick returns to the social hall, he is swept away by Joyce, Rachel Roberts, a nurse working for his father’s doctor, as police break up a fight. Later, at his old house, Mick and Joyce’s encounter turns into a clandestine romance.
Back in London, Mick and Hazlitt lead a successful board meeting, after which Mick goes home to bed a proposal to Rosemary. She tells him she is planning a party, not ready for a reconciliation, and he lashes out, descending into drinking and a volatile scene in which he strikes Sir Miles Bishton, a board member, John Hussey. The partygoers drift away as Mick rants about doing “dirty work” for English gentlemen. The next day, Hazlitt suspends him and anticipates dismissal as Moyle, the company’s head, Douglas Wilmer returns from abroad.
At home, Rosemary leaves Mick, and he heads back to Liverpool after a magistrate rules his father’s death accidental. He checks into a nondescript hotel, arranges for an alibi with the manager, borrows a local company car, and heads toward the social hall. There, Jones, the Teddy boy identified as his father’s attacker, Christian Rodska, appears, and Mick savagely beats him with a pipe. The morning after, the manager reveals that the police had been looking for him. Mick leaves the area, turning away from Joyce’s address when he sees her with children, and bids a heartfelt goodbye to his mother, who also reports that the police are questioning her about him. He returns home, thinking about Hazlitt’s secretary Hilda and the possibility of using her information, but he keeps his focus on the unfolding power dynamics at work.
Later, in a decisive confrontation with Moyle, Mick reveals that Hazlitt has repeatedly stolen ideas from underlings and shifted blame onto others, underscoring a pattern of manipulation. Moyle explains that he plans to replace Hazlitt with Mick, hinting that Mick might also seek to control the internal information network, though Mick notes that Hilda is not trustworthy. In a final moment of risk and reward, Moyle remarks that Rosemary’s departure might not be permanent, while Mick’s confidence grows.
On a motorway later, a reconciled Mick and Rosemary ride together, and the thrill of danger overtakes them. Mick accelerates toward a barrier, narrowly missing an oncoming truck, and, with a sense of exhilaration, proclaims, > If I can get away with that, I can get away with anything.
