Mustapha Benstiti

Raï is about a gang of youths in a Parisian suburb.This is the multicultural environment in which Mezz, Aziz, Laurent, Nordine, Poisson and the others have grown up. There is no future in Garges-les-Gonesses. Unemployment is high, drugs and violence are a part of everyday life. The opportunity to escape seems nonexistent.

Mary is a young girl, daughter of shepherds, promised in marriage to Joseph, a widower with two children, living in the nearby village of Nazareth, in the Galilee of two thousand years ago. Grown up in love and respect for the little ones, Mary, after leaving her home, soon sees the distortions of the patriarchal world surrounding her, starting with her husband's family. Here he reads the oldest brother of Joseph, Mordecai. The sunny and determined attitude of the girl, protective of children, arouses the indignation of the head of the family and those who are convinced of the need to give them punishment, discipline and submission.

Driss and Manuel both grew up on the same council estate. An estate where the sense of belonging to your patch is much stronger than the sense of belonging to a country, a nation or a culture... Manuel has assimilated this belonging, and he has even benefited from it and built his life on it. Driss, meanwhile, has shunned it. They will both have to face up to the consequences of their decisions – because they will each have a price to pay…

Dorothée has arranged a delicate balance between motherhood, economic survival and political commitment. It holds firm on one of the last roundabouts in France. Jules finds her to also defend his interests. Singing.