American Dick Saunders has just been transferred to Tokyo after a two-year stint in Manila. His wife Mary has accompanied him on the pretense to set up their home, with their adolescent son Tony arriving on a flight two weeks later. Dick requested the transfer to escape the source of marital strife between him and Mary, namely another woman, that being the real reason for their need for time alone without Tony. Mary has decided to take Tony back to the US with her instead. Their marital problems take a back seat upon learning that Tony's flight, facing mechanical problems, is lost somewhere en route and forced to land somewhere in the middle of the ocean. They are relieved to learn that while he was separated from the main group of passengers, Tony, alive, was picked up by a small family-operated Japanese fishing boat based 500km away from Tokyo. Taken care of by the Japanese family, the Tanakas, Tony befriends their similarly aged son, Hiko, the only one among the three in the family who speaks any English. But when Hiko overhears his father saying that he will be contacting the police about Tony, he and Tony run away in equating police with having done something bad, meaning Tony going to jail. So while Dick and Mary make their way to the fishing village, the two boys try to make their way to Tokyo to reunite Tony with his parents. However, what two adolescent boys believe is making their way to Tokyo 500km away may not always be reality as they try to survive with what little they brought with them.—Huggo
A plane on its way to Japan is forced to land at sea just off the Japanese coast. A small American boy survives the ditching, but is separated from the rest of the passengers and crew and is picked up by a Japanese fisherman, who takes the boy back to his village. The boy is befriended by the fisherman's son, but when they see Japanese Police swarming over the village, they are afraid that they've done something wrong and run away, although the Police are only searching for the missing boy. Together, the two boys travel through the Japanese countryside, trying to avoid the Police, who are searching for them and meeting up with many different kinds of people along the way.—[email protected]
In Tokyo, Japan, American diplomatic attaché Richard Saunders (Cameron Mitchell) and his wife Mary (Teresa Wright) await their seven-year-old son, Tony (Jon Provost), who is flying from their previous post of Manila to meet them. While Mary, who has learned that Dick had an affair in Manila, the reason him requesting this transfer, informs her husband that she is planning to leave him and take Tony back to the US with her, Tony's plane experiences engine failure and plunges into the ocean. By morning, Dick and Mary are frantic with worry, and the American embassy sends Col. Hargrave (Philip Ober) to keep them updated on the rescue operation. After fifteen hours, the first record of survivors is released, but when Tony's name is not among them, Hargrave reluctantly reveals that a heavy fog over the ocean is making the rescue difficult. Meanwhile, while sailing off the Japanese coast, fisherman Kei Tanaka (Susumu Fujita) and his wife Michiko (Kuniko Miyake) spot an unconscious Tony floating in a life raft, and pull him on-board. They nurse him back to health, aided by their young son Asahiko (Roger Nakagawa), nicknamed Hiko, who speaks halting English. Soon, Hiko teaches Tony to use chopsticks, while Tony teaches Hiko to play with a yo-yo. Once they reach the Tanakas' village, however, Hiko overhears his parents discussing the imminent arrival of the police, and wrongly assuming that Tony is in trouble, and thus runs away with his new friend so that Tony will not be sent to jail as they believe. When the Saunderses learn of Tony's rescue, they race to the village, only to find that both boys have disappeared. Although Mary and Michiko cannot converse, they feel connected in their mutual concern for their sons. The two boys hop on a truck, hoping to reach Tokyo, which Hiko vaguely knows is "over the mountains." When the truck gets a flat tire, they find a nearby farmhouse, where the kind residents feed them. They sleep in the barn, and are at first frightened by the dark but finally fall asleep in each other's arms. In the morning, they illegally board a train and talk about why their eyes have different shapes. Meanwhile, Mary grows more anxious, but after the farmers report having seen the boys, Japanese policeman Capt. Hibino (Katsuhiko Haida) publishes Tony's photograph in all of the country's newspapers and vows that they will be found soon. The children jump off the train in Kyoto and spend the day wandering past temples and through the marketplace. They dodge the police by slipping into a burlesque theater, where they worry that the women may be cold without their clothes. That night, the boys are welcomed into a geisha house, but after Hiko overhears the head geisha plan to call the police, the boys slip out at dawn. To avoid the increased police activity, they board a school bus, and there meet pretty schoolgirl Dekko (Hideko Koshikawa), who agrees to hide them. After the teacher leads the children on a tour of important temples, they share Dekko's lunch. By the end of the day, however, Dekko sees Tony's photograph in the paper and informs the teacher. He calls the police, who notify the Saunderses and Hibino. As Hibino orders a search of Kyoto, however, the frightened boys hop on another train believing it to be the Tokyo Express but is heading in the opposite direction. On board, an American G.I. (Steve McGrover) buys them ice cream, but when he sees the newspaper story about the missing boys after getting off the train at its penultimate stop, he calls the embassy. Hibino sets up a roadblock at Nara, the end of the train line, but the children escape into the city. Chased by the police, they climb several flights of stairs at a pagoda, stopping only when they have scrambled out onto the slanted roof and are perched high above the street. The Saunderses arrive as a crowd gathers below, and Dick races up to save the boys. Aided by the police, he crawls onto the ledge and pulls the boys to safety. Dick carries Tony to Mary's waiting arms, and while looking into Dick's eyes ,she promises the boy not only that the police will not take him away as he believed but that no one will separate the family again. When Dick turns to Hiko, however, the still-frightened boy runs away, and Dick catches him once again. Soon, everyone gathers at the Tanakas', where Dekko arrives to reunite with her new friends.
