Indonesian immigrant Sugiman ("Iman" for short), a single parent, has a bad dream featuring violence and blood. His disobedient son Joko spends too much time with the flaky grown-up Adi, and his sister Sumiati has run away from her job as a domestic helper and wants to go home to Indonesia. Sugiman turns to his construction-firm boss Sarip, Adi's father, for help and learns that he can buy his sister an illegal passage on a boat - at a price. In the meantime, he needs to keep Sumiati away from the police, so he hides her in a cheap hotel. The next-door room in the hotel is rented by Rico, a Filipino fixer who is under constant pressure to send money home to his mother. He works with his buddy Marzuki for big-boss Datuk, and has 'borrowed' some cash from the till to meet his immediate needs. But Datuk wants his money back ... For policeman Hassan, married with two small kids, money is always short. He has a small protection racket going with some shopkeepers and is always open to bribes from minor wrongdoers to let them off with a caution. When his boss James assigns him a new-recruit partner, Hussein, he's friendly to the new boy but tries to hide the fact that he's on the take. But Hussein is outraged when he finds out about the bribes, and turns out to be quite neurotic about bringing law-breakers to justice ... When Datuk's men catch Marzuki and he leads them to Rico, the commotion brings Hassan and Hussein to the scene. Outside the hotel, Hassan runs into Sumiati, who can't explain why she doesn't have a passport. A call brings Sugiman to save his sister from the cops. Meanwhile Datuk has secretly recorded police chief James's demands for kick-backs. And before anyone really knows what's happening, all hell has broken loose.
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