Ming Wang is an impoverished Chinese prodigy who flees Communist China to become a pioneering eye surgeon in America. When tasked with restoring the sight of an orphan in India, who was blinded by her stepmother, Wang must confront the trauma of living through the violent uprising in his youth, the Cultural Revolution.

A seemingly simple taxi ride across Paris evolves into a profound meditation on the realities of the driver, whose personal life is in shambles, and his fare, an elderly woman whose warmth belies her shocking past.

On Christmas Eve, a TV broadcasting station receives a phone call. The caller warns "I have set up a bomb at Ebisu in Tokyo." A contract worker for the TV broadcasting station and a housewife are accused by the Ebisu police as being the culprits. During this chaotic situation, a mysterious man silently watches as everything unfolds. A video clip is then uploaded to an online video website. The video contains a demand to talk with the Prime Minister during a live broadcast or a bomb will be detonated at 6 pm in Shibuya, Tokyo. Who is behind the bombings and who will stop them?

The story follows Fang Hui's carefully planned routine, however, he discovers that he cannot throw off the grip of fate. He will have to face the death of the being he loves the most, even if he tries to avoid fate, even if there are thousands of plans, he cannot escape the arrangements established by life.