Born to wealth -- and an aversion to manual labor -- Nathaniel Mayweather is an insufferably snide spoiled rich kid who sails through life with a rude attitude, showing nothing but contempt for his teachers and fellow classmates at the exclusive Stephenwood finishing school for young men. However, Nathaniel finally gets his fancy pants kicked in grand fashion when on the way to a luxury ocean cruise, he mistakenly boards The Filthy Whore, a dilapidated fishing trawler populated by a crew of scurrilous old salts who turn his life of leisure into deck-licking misery as their menial cabin boy.