In Maryam Touzani’s “Adam,” certain stylistic choices — a muted palette, the absence of a melodramatic score, hand-held camerawork — help temper sentimentality with verisimilitude. The movie tells a story of kindness given and returned. It opens with Samia (Nisrin Erradi) seeking a job as a hairdresser, and then as a maid, or really as anything. As a pregnant woman alone in Casablanca, she needs work and a place to stay — and encounters mainly indifference and judgment.

But after Abla (Lubna Azabal), a widow who initially refuses her, watches Samia sleep on the street outside, she takes her in on a temporary basis. Abla emphasizes that she doesn’t want problems from gossipy neighbors. But Abla’s young daughter, Warda (Douae Belkhaouda), likes Samia a lot, and Samia begins making a pastry that becomes a hit at Abla’s bakery.

Rather than repay Abla with quiet gratitude, Samia forces her to listen a cassette tape of the singer Warda, for whom Abla’s daughter is named. Abla hasn’t listened to the music since her husband died. Samia also pushes Abla to give a would-be suitor (Aziz Hattab) a chance.

This symmetry — how each needs the other to fulfill a need — flirts with being overly tidy. But Touzani has said that “Adam” was inspired by a real stranger her parents welcomed into their home, and there’s a fine sense of ambiguity — of what-ifs — in the closing moments. The ending hedges against the screenplay’s dramaturgical shorthand.

Adam
Not rated. In Arabic, with subtitles. Running time: 1 hour 38 minutes. In virtual cinemas and available to rent or buy on Amazon, Apple TV and other streaming platforms and pay TV operators.