Stevenson, the famous English criminal expert visits Hungary with his family. While he is chairing a conference on criminology, infamous art treasure robbers steal the golden herm of Saint László. Suspicion is cast on the Stevenson children.

Broad satire and buffoonery presented as a series of movie trailers. Among the titles and subjects are: "The Howard Huge Story", "Skate-boarders from Hell", "The Invasion of the Penis Snatchers", Woody Allen (pre-Mia), movie trailer come-ons, Charlie Chaplin, war movies, Billy Jack. The source of the title is presented about an hour into the film.

In the 1950s, a poor Georgia cotton farmer and his sons search for the gold presumably buried on the farm by their grandfather but problems related to poverty, marital infidelity, unemployment and booze threaten to destroy their family.

A group of strangers come across a man dying after a car crash who proceeds to tell them about the $350,000 he buried in California. What follows is the madcap adventures of those strangers as each attempts to claim the prize for himself.