Growing-up village boy Marcin Debik feels bored of existence in his native place and not interested in realizing his father's ideas for living there for ever and making business there. He dreams of living in a big town, making career there and, above all, having foreign automobile, preferably big one and of American make. His determination strengthens after he had accidentally attended some rich society's party for a while. Having finally decided to take his fate in his own hands, he takes leave of his family, his girl and departs for Lublin, the town where his uncle Lukasz runs own photographic studio. Marcin gets employed by his uncle and begins learning the photographer's trade. The boy quickly advances in the skill so that he can independently run the studio after the uncle's sudden and untimely death. Under his management the studio gets modernized, furnished with modern equipment and decorations. Introduced are new advertising methods that gathered him new clients. Soon he becomes successful. His dream to own a car may come true. Opportunity arose when a man he knew, a used cars dealer, offered him an American Pontiac. Although the car had a nice paintwork and at first glance looked "like new", it soon turned out to be almost completely worn-out jalopy that consumes fuel like mad and slowly cracks up losing part by part during driving. The resulting costs of maintenance and frequent repairs soon exceeded Marcin's financial abilities. The affair, however, did not end there but developed into unexpected final upshot.