Mbarek is a farmer who ekes out a living on a small plot of land in a rural Moroccan village. He lives there with his pregnant wife Ayda, his sick father and his teen-aged son Ayoub who has Down's Syndrome. This small piece of land is the family's sole source of income, and the family is devastated when the village is hit by a severe drought. Mbarek begins to dig a well in the desperate hope of finding a new source of water, when an official letter arrives threatening the confiscation of his land.