Laila in Haifa

Laila in Haifa is a 2020 Israeli-French production from writer-director Amos Gitai, set across a single night inside a seaside nightclub in the port city of Haifa. The venue draws together a mixed group of local patrons, whose overlapping stories the film follows as the night unfolds. Among the ensemble are veteran performer Makram Khoury and Clara Khoury, who share scenes as the club's various visitors cross paths over drinks and conversation. Gitai, known for tackling Israeli-Palestinian coexistence in his work, uses the confined setting to let tensions and affections surface between people who would rarely otherwise mix. The picture premiered in the main competition of the Venice Film Festival in its 77th edition, a notable selection for an intimate, dialogue-driven drama shot largely within one location. Reviewers at the time framed it as a tragicomic slice of contemporary Haifa nightlife rather than a conventional plotted narrative, built instead around a rotating gallery of characters and their brief encounters over the course of the evening.