O Lucky Man!

O Lucky Man! is a 1973 British comedy-drama fantasy film directed by Lindsay Anderson and starring Malcolm McDowell as Mick Travis, whom McDowell had first played as a disaffected public schoolboy in his first film performance in Anderson's if.... (1968). O Lucky Man! is the second film in the Mick Travis Trilogy, all starring McDowell, concluding with Britannia Hospital (1982).

The film is prefaced by a short story that begins "Once Upon a Time", a silent, black-and-white film that depicts an unnamed country filled with peasant labourers. They pick coffee beans while armed foremen push rudely between them. One worker (McDowell with black hair and a mustache) pockets a few beans for himself ("Coffee for the Breakfast Table"), but he is discovered by a foreman. He is next seen before a fat magistrate who slobbers as he removes his cigar only to say "Guilty." The foreman draws his machete and lays it across the unfortunate labourer's wrists, bound to a wooden block, revealing that he is to lose his hands for the theft of a few beans. The machete rises and falls, and the labourer draws back in a silent scream. The scene blacks out and the title "NOW" appears onscreen and quickly expands to fill it.

During his journey, Michael Arnold "Mick" Travis slowly learns the lesson (reinforced by numerous songs in the soundtrack by Alan Price), that he must abandon his principles in order to succeed in life. Nevertheless, unlike the other characters he meets, he retains a detached idealism that allows him to distance himself from the evils of the world. Initially, Travis is motivated only by money and material wealth. He begins by working as a coffee salesman, working for Imperial Coffee in North East England. He is seduced by the firm's human resources manager, Rachel Roberts. He travels to a hotel in the north east, where a tailor gifts him a golden suit, and he sleeps with the hotel manager, Mary MacLeod. While there, he's told to travel to Scotland as part of his job. He loses his way, and is arrested and tortured in a government installation. He's made to sign a confession, which makes it seem that he's been working for a foreign power for three years. The installation comes under what seems like a military attack, and he escapes through a burnt and blasted landscape. Coming across a church celebrating the harvest festival, he's found eating the harvest offerings by the vicar's wife, who instead offers him her breast to suckle on. She then gives him directions ('go south; there's nothing in the north for a boy like you').

Hitching a lift to London, he's offered £150 to participate in research at a private medical clinic. On arrival, he learns that they intend to sterilise him. He hides in the room of another patient, who he finds has had his head transplanted onto a cow-like animal. He jumps from a window, and catches a lift with a band who're heading for London. He meets Patricia, who takes him back to the band's flat.

In parallel with Travis's experiences, the narration shows 1960s Britain slowly retreating from its imperial past but retaining some influence by means of corrupt dealings with the foreign dictators of countries that had recently fought for their independence. After finding out his girlfriend Patricia is the daughter of Sir James Burgess, an evil industrialist, Travis is appointed Burgess' personal assistant. Burgess is allied with Dr. Munda, the dictator of Zingara (a fictional African country), who has created a brutal police state and playground for wealthy people from the developed world. Burgess sells the regime a chemical called "PL45 'Honey'", which the dictator sprays on rebel areas; its effects resemble those of napalm. When public outcry goes international, Burgess conspires to convict Travis of fraud. Travis is imprisoned for five years.

Five years later Travis has finished his sentence, become a model prisoner, and converted to humanism. He is quickly faced with a bewildering series of assaults upon his new-found idealism ("Look Over Your Shoulder"). While stopping at a slum on the outskirts of London he finds out that Patricia and her wealthy husband — whom Patricia married for financial stability while cheating on him with Travis — have lost all of their money and are living in extreme poverty. Travis' misadventures culminate in him being attacked by down-and-outs he had been trying to help.

Becoming despondent and wandering the streets, the now-destitute Travis inadvertently becomes involved in a casting call for a film production (with Lindsay Anderson himself playing the director of the film). He is given various props to handle, including a stack of schoolbooks and a Bren light machine gun (both reminiscent of Mick Travis' first chapter in the trilogy, if....). The director believes he has found the protagonist for his new film in Travis, but when asked to smile for his screen test Travis, failing to understand what is being asked of him, is befuddled and repeatedly asks why he should smile since he feels he has no reason to do so. Suddenly, the director slaps Travis with his script book, and Travis, having an epiphany, slowly begins to smile. After a cut to black (a device used throughout the film) Travis, wearing the golden suit, is shown dancing at a raucous party ("O Lucky Man!"), which includes all of the film's cast celebrating and finally balloons descending from the ceiling.

Many of the actors play several roles.