wait, wait! everybody, wait! there are plenty of planes coming. now everybody have patience. everything will be all right.
get me shanghai.
hello? hello?
colonel, i need more planes. i've still about twenty people to get out. where are those planes you promised us?
they better get here soon or i can't be responsible
and be sure that none of the natives get in.
hello? colonel?
thanks - and take care of that liver of yours.
all right, get ready everybody. the planes are here.
one at a time. children first. where are they? come on now, and stand over here.
where's the mother?
i see. all right.
gentlemen, please wait your turn.
just as you say!
all right, go ahead!
hello, fenner.
you never mind me. get this gadget off the ground.
get down on the floor, everybody. go ahead, fenner!
where did you come from?
why aren't you registered through our office?
where were you hiding?
i know - and a war broke out right over your head.
aha - very good, freshie. very good. you'd better put his name on the list and make out a report later.
don't talk nonsense. give me the bottle.
did you say we saved ninety white people?
hurray for us. did you say that we left ten thousand natives down there to be annihilated? no, you wouldn't say that. they don't count.
just you wait until i'm foreign secretary. can't you just see me, freshie, with all those other shrewd, little foreign secretaries?
don't worry, george. nothing's going to happen. i'll fall right into line. i'll be the good little boy that everybody wants me to be. i'll be the best little foreign secretary we ever had, just because i haven't the nerve to be anything else.
huh? oh, sure, freshie. good thing, sleep.
did you ever notice the sunrise in china, george? ah, you should. it's beautiful.
we're over the desert. that's funny.
charming chap.
well, that's that, i guess.
no. that's not possible! if we had landed, we all would have been awakened.
george, what are you going to do?
what if he refuses?
brilliant!
i guess we're in for it.
i don't know. he must have had some purpose in taking the plane away from fenner.
what do you suggest?
it might afford you a great deal of relief.
i don't know. i can't get the dialect.
imagine having all that fuel there, waiting for us!
huh? i give it up. but this not knowing where you're going is exciting anyway.
oh george, come on.
we got above that storm.
now, now. come on now. that's right. now, bite.
george - everybody - better get back towards the tail! he may nose her over. into the corner, quick! george - cushions, blankets!
everybody all right?
it looks like it.
he's dead.
it must have happened the moment he hit the ground.
see that spot?
that's where we were this morning. he had it marked. right on the border of tibet. here's where civilization ends. we must be a thousand miles beyond it - just a blank on the map.
it means we're in unexplored country - country nobody ever reached.
george, our chances of getting out of this are pretty slim. but it's up to us.
probably a heart attack.
well, there's nothing we can do until the morning.
the storm will probably die down by then. my suggestion is that we better all try and get a good night's rest.
you've no idea, sir, how unexpected and very welcome you are. my friends and i - and the lady in the plane - left baskul night before last for shanghai, but we suddenly found ourselves travelling in the opposite direction
we'd be eternally grateful if you
he must have had a heart attack, or perhaps the fumes. when the plane landed he was dead.
thank you.
that was refreshing! oh, ho - the food looks good!
it's better than freezing to death down below, isn't it?
and the wine - excellent.
good night, sir.
it seems to me we should be grateful. we were in a bad mess this morning.
not for me, thanks. no, i'm too weary.
hello, george.
we've had plenty of it the last few days.
oh, i'm feeling far too peaceful to be concerned about anything.
don't you ever want to see what's on the other side of the hill?
of course you would. if ever we get out of this place, the thing for you to do is to take that job with helen's father.
well - i mean
george, i've been putting things together. do you notice the resemblance between those natives and the pilot? and why did those clothes materialize so conveniently when they met us at the plane? chang himself just said that they never venture beyond that point. what brought them there? unless it was to meet us?
uh-huh.
that's what's on the other side of the hill.
who and what is shangri-la? you?
who, for instance?
he watches chang's face searchingly, then smiles.
for a man who talks a great deal, it's amazing how unenlightening you can be.
you know, that's the fourth time you've said that today. you should have a record made of it.
by the way, what religion do you follow here?
that's intelligent.
how about law and order? you have no soldiers or police?
how do you deal with incorrigibles? criminals?
you have no disputes over women?
suppose somebody wanted her so badly that he didn't give a hang if it was good manners or not?
that's very convenient. i think i'd like that.
some man had better get ready to be very courteous to me.
but mr. chang, all these things - books, instruments, sculpture - do you mean to say they were all brought in over those mountains by porters?
well, it must have taken–
centuries! where did you get the money to pay for all those treasures?
that would suit me perfectly. i'm always broke. how did you pay for them?
buy and sell?
who?
when was all this?
well, they didn't actually mean that.
well, is it?
108 and still active?
oh, no. just a little bowled over, that's all.
very often.
i surprise you? now that's news.
mr. chang, if you don't mind, i think i'll go on being amazed - in moderation, of course.
oh, you speak english, do you?
no, thanks. not just now.
well - i heard that if you want a man's wife, she's yours, if he's got any manners.
porters?
well, we haven't been murdered in our beds yet, george, have we?
shhh!
that's unkind. doesn't miss stone always look beautiful?
george, what do you think you're doing?
george, come back!
george, you idiot!
all right. sorry, george.
mr. chang!
do you mind stepping in here for a moment?
won't you sit down?
personally, i don't mind at all. i'm enjoying every minute of it.
we want to know why we were kidnapped, why we are being kept here, but most important of all - do we get the porters, and when?
mr. chang - high lamas or low lamas, do we get the porters?
one moment. you say the high lama is the only one who can give us any information?
and he can arrange for the porters to take us back?
well, then he's the man i want to see.
better wait here until i get back. we'll soon know where we stand.
are you the high lama?
personally, i've enjoyed your community very much. but my friends do not care for this mystery. they are determined to leave as soon as
you're the man chang told me about! you're the first - who - two hundred years ago
that i be brought here? who had that brilliant idea?
of course i have suspected that our being here is no accident. furthermore, i have a feeling that we're never supposed to leave. but that, for the moment, doesn't concern me greatly. i'll meet that when it comes. what particularly interests me at present is, why was i brought here? what possible use can i be to an already thriving community?
but to be candid, father, a prolonged future doesn't excite me. it would have to have a point. i've sometimes doubted whether life itself has any. and if that is so, then long life must be even more pointless. no, i'd need a much more definite reason for going on and on.
why - i'm sorry - but i
george. george - do you mind? i'm sorry, but i can't talk about it tonight.
do you mind?
how do you do?
not at all.
all right, children. now teacher is going to be very busy this afternoon, so school's dismissed!
oh, please. i hope you're not going to run away this time.
i hope you'll forgive me for
you suggested my being brought here, didn't you? what gave you the idea i'd fit in?
oh, you've read my books. you do more things! what have my books got to do with it?
a man whose life was empty!
a little boy whistling in the dark!? do you realize that there is a british cruiser waiting at shanghai, smoke pouring out of its funnels, tugging at its moorings, waiting to take mr. conway back to london? do you know that at this minute there are headlines shrieking all over the world the news that conway is missing? does that look like a man whose life is empty?
don't worry about the pigeons. from now on, you can put flutes on my tail and bells on my feet!
there are so many questions i'd like to ask you, i hardly know where to begin.
thank you.
father perrault! i envy you. i talked to him last night.
father perrault. of course i can't quite get used to this age thing.
oh, you're going to make life very simple.
all of it. father perrault and his magnificent history. this place, hidden away from the rest of the world, with its glorious concepts, and now you come along and confuse me entirely.
on the contrary, you're not strange. and that in itself is confusing. i have the same idea about shangri-la. the sense that i've been here before, that i belong here.
i can't quite explain it, but everything is somehow familiar. the very air that i breathe. the lamasery, with its feet rooted in the good earth of this fertile valley, while its head explores the eternal. all the beautiful things i see, these cherry blossoms, you - all somehow familiar.
i wonder.
then it wouldn't be a garden spot for long.
when the plane lands at shangri-la and wakes us all up.
ouch!
you know, sometimes i think that it's the other that's the dream. the outside world. have you never wanted to go there?
it's not so bad, really. some phases are a little sordid, of course. that's only to be expected.
oh, the usual reasons. a world full of people struggling for existence.
well, everybody naturally wants to make a place for himself, accumulate a nest egg, and so on.
you know, if you keep on asking that, we're not going to get anywhere. and don't ask me why.
it's the most annoying word in the english language. did you ever hear a child torture his parent with it?
because mother read it in a book somewhere, and if mother's little darling doesn't take her fingers out of the salad bowl this instant, mother's going to wring her little neck.
i'd love it!
forgiven.
say, what about that gold deal?
gold. you were going to
all right.
george.
george!
yes. i'm afraid it does.
yes, charming.
why not? she's an attractive young woman.
suppose she should leave it?
no, i mean about her appearance. if she should leave the valley - what would happen?
i knew you'd understand. that's why i came to you for help.
mine?
do you think this will come in my time?
you can't leave, george.
i will, george. i want to tell you. i'll burst with it if i don't. it's weird and fantastical and sometimes unbelievable, but so beautiful!
 . . and that's the whole story, george. he died as peacefully as the passing of a cloud's shadow. his last words to me were, "i place in your hands, my son, the future and destiny of shangri-la." now you know why i can't leave.
so you think i'm mad?
so you think it's all nonsense, huh?
i don't need any proof.
is that all my story meant to you?
then you'd better go, george. this is no place for you.
please, george. i don't want to talk about it anymore.
i'm tired of owing you things. you're free to go. go ahead.
enough! never mind the girl!
george, you couldn't possibly stay here, could you?
what's she got to do with it?
she came here in 1888!
you're wrong, george.
do you mean to tell me you want to leave shangri-la?
i thought the porters had instructions from the high lama not to take anyone.
father perrault is dead.
yes.
you're lying, aren't you?
the clothes?
what about the others?
yes, of course. certainly. come on!
what was that?
can't you shut up? must you go on babbling like an idiot?
there's nothing that would suit them better than to lose us, but we must go on.
george! george!