Famed outlaw Lotrando sends his son to a strict Catholic boarding school to learn manners, but the boy becomes too polite to lead the band. When they inadvertently arrive in a sultanate where the princess Zubeida lies gravely ill and are mistaken for physicians, father and son must overcome their inexperience and imposture to heal her and save the realm.

The movie is a satirical look at foreign occupation - a medieval Czech jester entertains a German king and his French wife, or a modern Czech villager helps a Bavarian hunter and his French wife find wild boar in Bohemia - the story switches back and forth between the two plots and time-periods.