The film depicts approximately 20 consecutive hours in the lives of three friends in their early twenties from immigrant families living in an impoverished multi-ethnic French housing project (a ZUP'''') in the suburbs of Paris, in the aftermath of a riot. History of the Jews in France Vinz (Vincent Cassel) is filled with rage. He sees himself as a gangster ready to win respect by killing a police officer, manically practising the role of Travis Bickle from the film ''Taxi Driver'' in the mirror secretly. His attitude towards police is a simplified, stylized blanket condemnation, also to individual police officers who make an effort to steer the trio clear of troublesome situations. Hubert (Hubert Koundé) is an Afro-French boxer and small-time drug dealer, the most mature of the three, whose gymnasium was burned in the riots. The quietest, most thoughtful and wisest of the three, he sadly contemplates the ghetto and the hate around him. He expresses the wish to leave his world of violence and hate behind, but does not know how since he lacks the means to do so. SaïdSayid in some English subtitles(Saïd Taghmaoui) is an Arab Maghrebis who inhabits the middle ground between his two friends' responses to their place in life.