Ajami is a 2009 film from Israel, directed by Scandar Copti and Yaron Shani.
It has several plot threads all dealing with the lives of people, mostly Arab Israelis, in the Ajami neighborhood of the port city of Jaffa. While the Arab Israelis aren't subjugated to the degree that their Palestinian cousins in the occupied territories are, theirs is not exactly an easy life. Among the characters that the story follows are:
- Omar, who is 19 years old and works in a restaurant owned by a wealthy man, Abu Elias. He is dating Abu Elias's daughter Hadir, but they are keeping their relationship secret because he is a Muslim and she is a Christian. That isn't Omar's only problem. A revenge cycle that started with a man coming into Omar's uncle's diner with a gun leads, through various shootings, to Omar owing nearly $60,000 of blood money. He has no easy way to pay it.
- Malek, who actually is a Palestinian, and who regularly sneaks into Abu Elias's restaurant to work illegally. His mother back in the West Bank is dying of cancer.
- Dando, a Jewish cop who works in vice hunting drug dealers. His brother has disappeared, and is eventually found murdered.
- Binj, a Muslim cook in the restaurant (played by co-director Scandar Copti). Binj's brother, who is on the run after fatally stabbing a Jewish man, has a large sack of drugs dropped off at Binj's apartment. Dando the vice cop is looking for those drugs.
Tropes:
- Anachronic Order: The stories are told in a scrambled timeline out of chronological order. In one scene, Jewish police attempt to nab a drug dealer, only for the drug dealer to get away when a crowd of Arab locals interferes. Much later in the movie, as Dando and company are searching Binj's apartment, they get a call to assist in that very incident. The climactic scene where Omar attempts to sell his drugs, only for the drug dealers to attack him, comes early in the film. The last act of the film then shows how Omar came to have the drugs in the first place, as well as revealing who the "drug dealers" making the buy actually are.
- Bait-and-Switch Gunshot: The first time we see the drug deal, early in the film, the scene cuts away after the gunshot in such a way that it seems that Dando has just shot Malek. When the scene is shown again at the end, it reveals that instead of Dando shooting Malek, it was actually young Nasri, with his brother's gun, shooting Dando square in the chest.
- The Cassandra: Nasri, Omar's little brother, begs him not to go off for the drug deal, and pleads even more desperately when he sees Omar has brought a gun, saying that something terrible will happen. Omar ignores him, and three people pay with their lives as a result.
- Chalk Outline: The news shows that someone has already drawn a chalk outline around the body of the murdered Jewish man, even as the body still lies in the street.
- Downer Beginning: Barely a minute into the movie, a boy named Yihyah is gunned down outside of Omar's family's house. The killers from the rival clan mistook him for Omar.
- Downer Ending: Nasri, who sees Dando pointing a gun at Malek and thinks that Dando is a drug dealer, shoots and kills him. Dando's partners shoot and kill Nasri. Malek dies in the crossfire. The film ends with Omar, who escapes, running back to the van only to realize that his little brother Nasri did not wait there as instructed.
- Dramatic Gun Cock: Dando, overcome with rage after finding what he thinks is his dead brother's watch on Malek, chambers a round in his gun. This triggers the bloodbath.
- Drugs Are Bad: Binj elects to snort some of the cocaine that his brother left in the apartment. He overdoses and dies, which is bad, It's also bad because he never gets the chance to tell Omar what he did with the drugs, thus leading to tragedy.
- Ensemble Cast: No clear lead, but a whole cast of characters each getting screen time as various Four Lines, All Waiting plots play out.
- Four Lines, All Waiting: The film cuts back and forth between various interlinked plot lines. Omar has to raise blood money to pacify the rival clan, lest he be murdered. Malek needs money for his mom's operation. Dando's brother is missing. Binj is in love with a Jewish girl. Omar is dating his boss's daughter.
- Healthcare Motivation: Malek agrees to help Omar sell a pack of drugs, because he needs to get $75,000 for his mother's bone marrow transplant.
- Hyperlink Story: All the principals are linked with each other and their stories overlap. Dando the cop searches Binj's apartment. Omar and Malek wind up making the drug deal together because they both need money.
- The Illegal: Malek is a Palestinian who lives in the occupied territories. He has to sneak his way into Jaffa to work in the restaurant, then he hides in a shipping container in his off time. He is delayed in getting back to his dying mother because he's on the wrong side of the wall.
- Inner Monologue: Nasri's inner thoughts form a sort of narrative track to the film. When he thinks "I felt something bad would happen" he's quite right, as Yihyeh is shot immediately after.
- Maligned Mixed Marriage
- Binj is dating a Jewish woman and is talking about moving to a Jewish neighborhood with her. His Arab friends react with disgust.
- Abu Elias is a Christian, and he flatly forbids his daughter to marry a Muslim. When Hadir refuses to give Omar up, Abu Elias tips off the police about Omar's drugs, with tragic consequences.
- Murder by Mistake: Poor Yihyah is shot to death by killers who mistook him for Omar.
- Once More, with Clarity: The Anachronic Order structure results in later scenes clarifying what has gone on before. Malek sees three men entering Binj's apartment. He and Omar hear that Binj has died and Malek assumes that the three men were drug dealers who killed him; they then go to Binj's apartment and find a blood-stained towel. Later scenes reveal that the three men were vice cops (including Dando) there to search Binj's apartment, and the blood on the towel was from Binj's nosebleed as he was dying of a cocaine overdose.
- The Place: The Ajami district of Jaffa, mainly Arab, and poor and crime-ridden.
- Plot-Triggering Death: The series of disasters starts when the rival clan mistakes an innocent boy for Omar and shoot him to death in the street. Although the real plot-triggering death is shown later in a flashback, when the guy from the rival clan barged into Omar's uncle's diner with a gun and got shot to death by Omar's uncle.
- Stupid Crooks: In Omar's defense, he's a complete amateur who blunders into a drug deal out of desperation in order to pay an enormous debt. But still, he mistook a bag of sugar for drugs and tried to sell it.
