Fourteen-year-old Sami (Samy Seghir) is a ''beur'' (a French person of North African descent) living in Chalon-sur-Saône, a relatively poor city in the Burgundy (French region) region. When his widowed mother (Farida Khelfa) takes a job working on a boat, she sends Sami to live with her sister Djamila (Rachida Brakni), who is married to Frenchman Stanislas de Chazelle (Denis Podalydès). They live in the upscale neighborhood of Neuilly-sur-Seine, an affluent suburb of Paris, with Stanislas' two children from his prior marriage: Charles (Jérémy Denisty), who aspires to be a politician someday, and Caroline (Chloé Coulloud). At first Charles resents Sami's presence in his house, but they gradually become friends. Sami enrolls in classes at Saint-Exupéry, a private school there.