Real-life clown Jack Thum, along with his devoted wife, Shirlee, cared for dozens of homeless children — 37 of them over the years — in the Chicago area, all of whom come back to visit when they discover he's terminally ill.
A sensitive girl is sent to an all-girls boarding school and develops a romantic attachment to one of her teachers.
Alexander Calder created and performed one of the most important and beloved works, his miniature circus (1926-1931). More than twenty years later Jean Painleve made Le Grande Cirque Calder 1927, begun in 1953 and completed in 1955.
A young boy and his family set off on a sailing trip of a lifetime until a violent storm erupts, sweeping Michael and his dog overboard. After washing up on a remote island, terrified, they struggle to survive and adjust to life alone, One day, Michael discovers he is not alone when he is confronted by a mysterious Japanese man who has lived there secretly since World War II, angry that Michael has arrived. However, as dangerous invaders threaten their fragile island paradise, Michael and the old man, Kensuke, join forces to save their secret world.
Kanchan, all of eight years old, is always up to pranks and mischief in his village home. He finds his father a cruel demon who keeps his mother oppressed and imprisoned. In his dreams, the big city is El Dorado, until he reaches there.
Turkish Pollyanna's story.
After a socially conscience reporter adopts a slum orphan after she causes his brother's gang to go to prison.
The arrival of a travelling circus sends ripples through the inhabitants of a remote Keralan village.
During the Vietnam War, Brian Anderson, a young Army medic, is stationed in Saigon. Initially apathetic and self-serving, he eventually has his heart won over by the children at a nearby orphanage where he does volunteer work. At first, a doctor named Katherine Cross has to persuade him to help the children. But soon, Brian willingly puts his career and safety on the line to provide the orphans with the food and medical supplies they need.
Orphan boy and vicar's daughter fall in love but her father is strongly opposed to their relationship.
Set in a 1910 circus, young Charlotte travels from city to city with her acrobat family who perform on the Trapeze. With her training almost complete, she already takes on the daring Blindfolded trick. Despite never having successfully completed the trick, Charlotte is determined to do the trick at the upcoming performance. But worries about that take a back seat when Charlotte learns about the circus potentially going out of business. She's determined to find the truth about whether or not she- and her daring Trapeze act- are the secret to saving the circus. But to do that, she will have to get into the Forbidden Train Car Z.
Oskar Matzerath is a very unusual boy. Refusing to leave the womb until promised a tin drum by his mother, Agnes, Oskar is reluctant to enter a world he sees as filled with hypocrisy and injustice, and vows on his third birthday to never grow up. Miraculously, he gets his wish. As the Nazis rise to power in Danzig, Oskar wills himself to remain a child, beating his tin drum incessantly and screaming in protest at the chaos surrounding him.
An emotional journey of a former school teacher, who writes letters for illiterate people, and a young boy, whose mother has just died, as they search for the father he never knew.
Singing Marseilles docker Joe is hired by wealthy English couple, the Oliphants, to find their missing son Gerald. When Joe finds him, he learns Gerald escaped of his own will and takes him to stay with a local singer, who offers a refuge from his repressed white parents.
Homer is an orphan who was never adopted, becoming the favorite of orphanage director Dr. Larch. Dr. Larch imparts his full medical knowledge on Homer, who becomes a skilled, albeit unlicensed, physician. But Homer yearns for a self-chosen life outside the orphanage. What will Homer learn about life and love in the cider house? What of the destiny that Dr. Larch has planned for him?
Lah is a mahout who works his elephant at an illegal logging site in Burma. When they're about to get busted, he sends his son Saeng and his elephant to relatives in Bangkok. Saeng ends up begging the streets of Bangkok with his elephant and he comes in contact with the local mafia who wants their cut or else.
Saeng is helping his friend Nual repay her family debt by once again taking his elephant on the streets. But the money isn't any good so they decide to enter an elephant competition with a prize money more than enough to repay the debt.
When Ruby and Rhett's parents are killed in a car accident, their carefree teenage lives are suddenly shattered. Moving to an incredible house in Malibu with the Glasses', old friends of the family, seems to be the beginning of a new life for them.
An actress becomes taken with Hitty, a young orphan prone to dreaming. Julie soon finds out that she is ill and has only a short time to live. She decides to adopt the child so that her husband Bill will not be alone when she dies. Unfortunately, Bill is not charmed by Hitty.
Lena is seven months pregnant and she's ready to sell the baby in her belly. Ermanno agrees to pretend to be the father. Fabio, the uncle of Ermanno, will pay them to buy the child that he and his wife Bianca cannot have. A fake adoption between relatives, a loophole to bypass the law in Italy. A world in which money is the only standard of value, the only thing that matters. Ermanno and Lena are two strangers that must pretend in public to be a couple and live together until the delivery. They are used to only thinking about themselves and they fight all the time. But living side by side they start becoming what they were only pretending to be.