| Director | Benh Zeitlin |
|---|---|
| Budget | $6 million |
| Box office | $266,770 |
In 1973, Wendy Darling lives in the rural South with her waitress mother Angela and twin brothers James and Douglas. Back when their next-door neighbor and cousin Thomas Marshall was celebrating his birthday, Thomas storms outside (on discovering what his future will be as an adult) and disappears, with a toddler Wendy watching him being lured into climbing aboard a passing train car by a hooded childlike figure.
One night, as a train passes by their bedroom window, Wendy notices a boy riding on top of the train cars. The three children climb out of their window and join the boy, Peter, who takes them all to a tropical island with an active volcano, which Peter calls "Mother". The island is populated by other children, including their long-lost cousin Thomas, who has not aged a day in over seven years. Peter explains that Mother's spirit resides in the volcano and prevents the children from aging, so long as they believe in her. They later discover a large glowing fish, which is Mother's other form with Wendy then secretly coming across a dated photograph of a deceased family of islanders (in some sort of subterranean shrine decorated with paintings deep beneath a sea cave) that include Peter and concludes Mother must've saved him from a natural disaster (that killed the other islanders) and shared her powers with Peter making him ageless.
While exploring a capsized boat called the Mañana, Douglas injures his head and disappears from sight. The children search for him without success. Missing his twin brother, James withdraws emotionally and his right hand begins to show signs of age. James becomes afraid and asks Peter to cut the hand off lest he become old, which he does. Shocked and disgusted, Wendy takes the wounded James away from the group and is helped by Buzzo, well known by the younger kids as being a former member of their group (who lost his faith in Mother and grew old after his best friend died). Buzzo brings Wendy and James to a settlement of "Olds," children who lost faith in Mother and thus began to age normally. James, bitter at having to grow up without Douglas, rallies the group to kill and eat Mother's fish form in order to regain their youth. The Olds kidnap the children to use as bait for Mother and repurpose the Mañana as a fishing boat.
While evading the Olds, Wendy and Peter find Douglas alive. They swim to the Mañana, where they find the now elderly James, with a hook in place of his missing right hand. As Peter and Wendy rescue the children, James kills Mother with a harpoon. With Peter and the children mournful and the Olds disheartened, Wendy gets them to all start singing, which inspires Peter and revitalizes the volcano. Wendy and Douglas decide it is time for them to go home plus also bring Thomas back with them to give his family closure (along with two other tag along lost children). Knowing that he cannot go home, James stays to play with Peter as his new “enemy” Captain Hook, thereby allowing him to live out the rest of his days with the spirit of a child. 25 years later, Wendy, now a mother herself, wakes to find her daughter Jane climbing aboard a passing train car with none other than Peter himself, still unchanged by time. Unable to keep up, Wendy comforts herself that Peter will look after her daughter and eventually return Jane back home to Wendy.