An actor from the provinces, a soap-opera star, reaches the big city with dreams of success. Partly through sincerity and partly prompted by an uneasy conscience, he wants to revolutionize the traditional photo-novel by linking it to social and political reality, to "bring social conscience to the masses" by utilizing this traditionally manipulative and alienating mass medium. The film narrates, in a tragicomic tone, the itinerary followed by Gualberto Rodriguez in his efforts to produce his 'revolutionary' photo-novel: the story of a peasant that migrates to the city, becomes a blue-collar worker, tries to establish a union, and ends up falling in love with the factory owner's daughter. The 'revolutionary' ends up being used, manipulated, and his project fails completely.