An adventurous orphan tries to save her school when the aristocratic owner decides to sell it. Along the way she befriends a stray dog and the mischievous son of the Spanish ambassador - and together they thwart a gang hired by the boy's sinister tutor to kidnap him. Family comedy based on Ludwig Bemelman's classic children's books, starring Hatty Jones, Frances McDormand and Nigel Hawthorne.

Horrified at the prospect of her beloved school being sold, a young French girl named Madeline uses her wit and craftiness to attempt to save it, making an unlikely new friend in the process.