
Or (My Treasure)
2004

2009
Director
Keren Yedaya
Runtime
106 minutes
Average Rating
No ratings yetSynopsis
In the city of Jaffa; a young girl plans to run away with her secret lover, when a tragedy forever changes the course of their lives. Jaffa is a mixed Arabic - Jewish seaside city near Tel Aviv, where Reuven Wolf (Moni Moshonov) has a garage for repairing cars. His wife Ossi (Ronit Elkabetz), a vain, self-centered woman, just makes everybody's life difficult. The couple's daughter, Mali Wolf (Dana Ivgy), has secretly fallen in love with her childhood friend, the young Toufik (newcomer Mahmud Shalaby), a hard-working youth who has come as a helping hand to his Israeli-Arab father Hassan, a long-time mechanic working for Reuven.
Overall Score
Good
Category Breakdown
LGBTQ+ Representation
The film lacks focus on queer identities or non-cisnormative narratives. Its central romance follows a traditional heteronormative structure, even as it explores social transgression.
Gender Representation
The narrative disrupts hierarchies by centering female experiences in male-dominated spaces. Characters like Ossi and Mali provide complex, agency-driven perspectives that drive the film's emotional arc.
Racial & Ethnic Diversity
The film excels by portraying the mixed Arabic-Jewish reality of Jaffa. It uses a diverse cast to explore the friction and coexistence within a complex ethnic tapestry.
Religious & Cultural Diversity
The story critiques socioeconomic structures and the failures of the social safety net. It frames survivalist behaviors as logical responses to systemic neglect rather than individual moral failings.
Disability Representation
There are no prominent depictions of visible or invisible disabilities serving as central character arcs within the narrative.
Strengths
Areas for Improvement
AI Analysis
Jaffa is a gritty exercise in social realism that avoids idealized community depictions. It succeeds by centering the intersectional tensions of a mixed Arabic-Jewish seaside city, using characters like Toufik and Hassan to provide essential counter-perspectives to the Jewish Wolf family. The film's strength lies in its refusal to present a homogeneous landscape. By focusing on socioeconomic deprivation and ethnic friction, it dismantles conventional domestic stability and critiques the systemic failures that drive marginalized identities. However, the film remains rooted in heteronormative romantic structures and lacks representation for LGBTQ+ identities or characters with disabilities.

2004

2017

2014

2011

2008

1982

2009

2007

2012

2021

2008

2013
No reviews yet. Be the first to share your thoughts on this movie!
Use the rating form above to leave a star rating and optional review.