Canadian surgeon Dr. Norman Bethune (Donald Sutherland) journeys 1,500 miles into China to reach Mao Zedong's eighth route Army in the Wu Tai mountains where he will build hospitals, provide care, and train medics. Flashbacks narrate the earlier events of his life: a bout with tuberculosis at the Trudeau sanatorium; the self-administration of an experimental pneumothorax; the invention of operative instruments; his fascination with Socialism; a journey into medical Russia; and the founding of a mobile plasma-transfusion unit in war-torn Spain. Bethune twice married and twice divorced his wife Frances (Dame Helen Mirren), who chooses abortion over child-rearing in her unstable marriage. By 1939, Bethune had been dismissed from his Montreal Hospital for taking unconventional risks, and from his volunteer position in Spain for his chronic problems of drinking and womanizing. As his friend states: "China was all that was left." Even there, Bethune confidently ignores the advice of Chinese officials until heavy casualties make him realize his mistake and lead him to a spectacular apology.
歌女小兰与盲母靠街头卖唱度日,生活艰难。青年白龙曾因驾车撞人入狱,出狱时听到小兰在唱《街头月》。小兰的歌声十分动听,白龙很感动,将身上所有的钱都给了盲母。一个流浪儿将钱抢走,盲母拼命争夺受伤,白龙将钱追回,二人交往渐多,互生好感。电台举办歌唱比赛,白龙鼓励小兰参加,听了小兰的试唱,电台执事十分高兴。小兰回到家中,盲母疑心她在外不轨,小兰负屈离家出走与白龙纵酒。白龙酒后驾车再次撞人入狱,小兰去参加比赛,却昏倒当场……