Tommy Tricker and the Stamp Traveller 1988

Ralph James, Lucas Evans, is a shy stamp enthusiast living in Montreal whose timid nature and stutter make him easy to overlook. One day, his classmate Tommy Tricker, Anthony Rogers, a crafty stamp exchanger and con artist, drops by his house with a bold deal: exchange a spare Bluenose stamp — the one showing a man on the ship’s mast and owned by Ralph’s father — for a collection of rare permanent stamps. Though hesitant at first, Ralph agrees, only for Tommy to swap in a different set of stamps and vanish with the Bluenose, selling it to a stamp shop for about $300 to buy groceries.

Ralph’s parents return home with Mr. Bronson, an elderly stamp collector, and Ralph hides in the backyard rather than confront the situation. At his sister Nancy’s suggestion, the two siblings head to the stamp store to try to buy back the stamp, but their funds fall short. The shop owners, moved by pity, give Nancy an old stamp album for free. Back home, Ralph dismisses the album as junk, but a hidden letter tucked inside the book’s front cover reveals a connection to Charles Merriweather, an eleven-year-old from 1913, and a second note in the back hints at a hidden treasure: a priceless stamp collection tucked away in a Sydney shop.

Joined by their friend and classmate Albert, Andrew Whitehead, Ralph and Nancy learn that the album once belonged to Charles Merriweather and that the mystery points toward a daring possibility: a secret magic riddle that lets a person shrink down and enter a stamp, enabling travel by mail. The three set out to find Charles’s collection, unaware that Tommy has overheard their plans and is racing to grab the stamps for himself.

As the trio pursues the quest, Tommy and his ally Cass, Paul Popowich, each pursue their own twists of mischief. In a park, Ralph recites the riddle and, to everyone’s astonishment, is transformed into a miniature traveler who enters a Mountie stamp on a letter headed for the Sydney shop. Nancy and Albert try to retrieve the letter, but a mysterious force separates them, forcing Ralph to venture alone. The letter zigzags through a chain of owners — a child, a thief, a homeless man — until Tommy seizes the stamp and affixes it to a stolen postcard, setting Ralph adrift on a new course.

The postcard travels to Chen Tow, a young boy in Hangzhou, China, where Nancy’s pen pals and Mai Ling, Han Yun, help translate the messages. Ralph, still inside the stamp, peels away from the bustling street scene in Hangzhou, initially reluctant to enter another stamp because the city feels overwhelming. Mai Ling interprets this as a test of courage, and with Chen Tow by his side, Ralph and Mai Ling embark on a voyage by boat toward a different destination. After a narrow escape when Chen Tow slips into the water, Ralph dives in to save him, and they press on as a new stamp is prepared to carry them toward Sydney again.

Delivered in Sydney to Cheryl, Catherine Wright, the granddaughter of the shop’s former owner, Ralph learns that a boy claiming to be Charles had arrived a day earlier in search of the grandfather’s belongings. Cheryl takes him to Mad Mike, a former zookeeper whose sanity has been frayed by tragedy. They realize that the “Charles” who arrived was actually Tommy in disguise, and they witness Tommy’s capture and detention. To secure the stamp book and Tommy’s safety, Ralph offers a koala for Mad Mike’s zoo, a trade that succeeds, and Tommy notes that Ralph no longer stutters.

The next morning, a kangaroo delivers Ralph and Tommy back to Canada. They present Charles Merriweather’s stamp book to Ralph’s parents and Mr. Bronson, who has somehow reacquired the original Bluenose and passes it back to Ralph’s father. Yet Bronson reveals a second Bluenose, one with a boy pictured on the bow holding a briefcase and inscribed with the name “Charles.” Realizing that the boy is Charles Merriweather, Ralph hatches a plan to mail the stamp to himself to free Charles from the centuries-long confinement within the stamp. Tommy, unwilling to let go of the treasure, steals the stamp again, sparking a frantic chase through the streets.

In a final voice-over, Ralph explains that Tommy, after a brief relapse, eventually mailed the stamp to Mr. Bronson, freeing Charles, who is still physically eleven but now seventy-one. Charles then resides in a spare bedroom at Bronson’s house, a living link between the stamp’s secret past and the present adventures of Ralph and his friends.