Mo is a Netflix comedy centring around the life and experiences of the eponymous protagonist Mohammed Najjar and his family in Houston, America.
Streaming on Netflix, Mo stars Mohammed Amer as the Palestinian refugee living in Houston with his mother and brother. Starring Teresa Ruiz, Omar Elba, Farah Bsieso, Toby Nwigwe, and Lee Eddy in supporting roles, the Netflix comedy-drama offers a pithy glimpse into Palestinian-American lives and their fight for citizenship.
The official synopsis of the movie reads, “In Texas, Mo straddles the line between two cultures, three languages and a pending asylum request while hustling to support his Palestinian family.”
Mo Story Summary
Mohammed “Mo” Najjar (Mohammed Amer) is a Palestinian refugee working at a hardware shop in Houston. Mo and his family are not legal citizens of America, making do with an Asylum claim from Mo’s father Mustafa’s death and imprisonment and a continually delayed court proceeding. When the store owner Rahman’s other store gets raided by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), he fires Mo as a precautionary measure.
Returning home to his mother Yusra (Farah Bsieso) and elder brother Sameer (Omar Elba), Mo decides to keep news of his recent firing from his family. Mo consoles his Mexican-Catholic girlfriend of two years Maria (Teresa Ruiz) that he will make do with his bootleg and counterfeit business till he gains employment elsewhere.
When Mo visits the supermarket to buy cat food for Sameer’s cat, he gets caught in a minor shooting which results in a bullet graze on his left arm. Uninsured and paperless, Mo refuses first aid and gets his wound treated and stitched by his friend Chien.
He is greeted by a very concerned Yusra when she realizes he has been shot and gets even more aggravated when she discovers the tattoo of his father’s name on his arm.
Flashbacks into the family’s past reveal how the family escaped Kuwait during the Gulf War in 1991, where Mo had to leave with his mother and brother for Houston, leaving his father behind.
As Mo continues with his counterfeit business, the pain from his bullet wound gets him addicted to “Lean”- Promethazine with Codeine Syrup. When Uncle Yusuf passes away, the family attends Azza and Maria joins them.
Their immigration agent Rhonda Modad (Cynthia Yelle) attends the ceremony, promising the widowed Samia priority for gaining citizenship much to the aggravation of the Najjars who have been on the waiting list for years. When Mo visits Rhonda after repeated failed attempts at contacting her, he finally fires her out of frustration.
Desperate to secure a paying job, Mo joins the “Dreams” strip club as the DJ. Meanwhile, Yusra feels insecure about her inactive lifestyle and sends Mo to Buddy’s olive farm to fetch olives for her speciality homemade olive oil.
Mo decides to visit the Jewish lawyer Lizzie Horowitz upon his friend Hameed’s recommendation. While talking about the case, Lizzie reveals that his asylum claims are based on his father’s torture, reluctantly showing him images of his body tortured with cigarette burns. Mo is rattled by this new knowledge, especially when he realizes his mother had kept the truth from him all this while.
Distraught and disturbed by the news, a man smoking in the club triggers traumatic memories of his father, provoking him to pick a fight with the man and subsequently getting him fired. Realizing his anguish needs addressing, he agrees to go to confession with Maria.
Finding some consolation and mental relief after the confession, Mo decides to gain employment at Buddy’s olive farm, and he is tasked with setting up the trackers to prevent further olive tree thefts from the farm.
When Maria’s father ruins her credit score by taking a hoard of credit cards under her name, she is compelled to approach her friend Shila and her millionaire husband Glen to invest in her second mechanic shop.
However, their acceptance to lend her money leads them to behave condescendingly, making Maria feel like a charity case. Inflamed after she confronts Shila about her behaviour, Maria storms out, valuing her dignity over money.
Meanwhile, Mo gets caught in a sticky situation when a simple sale meeting with Dante plunges Mo into the midst of a kidnapping. The kidnapped man is revealed to be Chien, tortured for failing to save Dante’s leg after an accident. Promising 15% of Chien’s business for three years and a sizeable portion of his counterfeit business, Mo manages to save Chien’s life but is left indebted to Dante.
When Lizzie requires the deed for the Najjars’ Kuwaiti house for paperwork, Mo is compelled to visit his estranged sister Nadia in Galveston. Meanwhile, when Sameer’s boss at Chick n Cone rudely fires him for taking 200 dollars from the cash register, Sameer (diagnosed with Aspergers) is distressed and locks himself in the washroom.
A concerned Mo and Nadia rush to calm him and the three siblings visit their father’s unmarked grave as they pay their respects.
As Mo’s friend Hameed’s wedding day approaches, Dante assigns him a package collection task on the same day. Caught in between Hameed’s Zaffa procession and Dante’s orders, Mo manages to sneak out and hesitantly collects drugs when faced with a direct threat against his mother.
When pressured by Nick to use his drug-containing car to drive them to the wedding, the three get stuck at a police checkpoint. However, they lie about visiting the Lakewood Church as a specially invited international gospel choir, thus safely leaving without getting their car checked.
During the wedding ceremony, Mo is highly disturbed by the day’s events and impulsively proposes to Maria, confessing his mix-up with Dante and his lackeys. Indignant and angry, Maria is inflamed at being lied to and refuses his proposal, subsequently ending their two-year relationship.
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Mo Ending Explained
Reeling from his recent breakup with Maria, Mo throws out the lean in an attempt to stop his addiction. Flashbacks of their escape from wartime Kuwait are reignited as Lizzie prepares the family for their court trial.
Ready with their paperwork and speeches, the Najjar family finally goes to the immigration courthouse for their court date. After a clerical error lands them in the wrong building, Lizzie manages to fight to get them through.
However, the judge is revealed to have worked with Mustafa years back, compelling him to recuse himself from the case and indefinitely reschedule the court date.
Disappointed and demoralized, the family returns home and Mo struggles with withdrawal symptoms. Yusra decides to begin her olive oil business, leading Mo to lash out at her out of frustration with the asylum case. Calming down, he decides to help her by fetching fresh olives from the farm.
However, Mo returns to a bleak Buddy as all 21 trees are stolen, leading to a 50,000 dollars loss. Mo promises to retrieve the olive trees using the tracker in exchange for allowing his mother to press the olives on the farm.
Convincing Nick to lend him his car, the two set out to track the olive tree thieves and locate the truck with all the stolen trees. However, when the thieves approach them, they hastily hide inside the truck, consequently trapping them in as the thieves begin to drive away.
Mo reveals how his childhood stint of stealing 20 dollars still bothers him because he let down his father. After hours of being trapped in the truck, mobile notifications alert the trapped duo that they have crossed over to Mexico.
Is Mo able to return to Houston?
Having unintentionally deported themselves, Mo and Nick try to sneak out but their commotion gets them caught. Manny is revealed as the thief, a fellow worker at Buddy’s olive farm.
Mo manages to reason with Manny, agreeing to take back three trees and get the credit to allow his mother’s oil-pressing deal to pass. Manny arranges for them to get through the border, and Nick and Mo split up.
Meanwhile, Yusra visits Maria at her workplace, grudgingly admitting that she made Mo happy despite her concerns about their mismatched backgrounds. Maria opens up to her as she reveals she wanted a partner in Mo, instead finding a caretaker in him. The two women bond as Yusra offers Maria a conciliatory bottle of olive oil.
In the meantime, the men escorting Mo beat him up when provoked about their illegal profession, and Mo is asked to re-enter America via a narrow tunnel. A sudden bomb explosion through the tunnel is followed by frantic men running out the opening and attacking Manny’s henchmen.
Amidst the din and confusion, Mo grabs the keys to the bike and rides away, making Manny’s men believe he’s in league with their enemies from the tunnel. Distressed and confused, he calls Maria and confesses his blundered entry into Mexico.
Scared and on the run without a passport in Mexico, Mo desperately rides into the distance as Manny’s men chase him.
Mo is now streaming on Netflix.
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