A (Ad Infinitum) (2021) Timeline Explained – Every Event in Order

Sanjeev is found injured in a forest 59 km from Hyderabad because he is actually Ashwatthama, a fugitive who fled after bombing a police station decades ago. He went into hiding at his brother Arjun's remote forest house, where he underwent immortality experiments. The memory loss and injuries resulted from this hidden past and the experimental procedures performed on him.

Foreshadowing: His recurring dream of a dark room performing brain surgery hints at the medical procedures that altered his memory and body.

• amnesia
• forest
• ashwatthama
• sanjeev
• injury

Ashwatthama is a student leader from over 30 years ago who was wanted for bombing a police station and never located. Sanjeev discovers he IS Ashwatthama, he changed his identity and underwent immortality experiments with his brother Arjun. The photo discovered by Yasir showing a lookalike was actually Sanjeev himself from decades earlier.

Foreshadowing: The photograph in the Emergency-era book foreshadows Sanjeev's true historical identity.

• ashwatthama
• identity
• sanjeev
• fugitive
• bombing

Children are being kidnapped by Arjun (Sanjeev's brother) to serve as subjects for his brain surgery experiments aimed at perfecting his immortality formula. He targets orphans and runaways because their absence is less likely to be noticed. The tonsured patients in the dark room are these kidnapped children who underwent the experimental procedures.

Foreshadowing: The CCTV footage of a hooded man with a dog matches the abductions that ultimately connect to Arjun's laboratory.

• kidnapping
• children
• arjun
• experiments
• brain surgery

Arjun targets Ammu because she is Sanjeev's daughter, and Sanjeev is one of the two successful immortals created through Arjun's experiments. Ammu carries the genetic key to amplifying the immortality process, making her essential for Arjun to replicate the effect on others and perfect his research.

Foreshadowing: Arjun's revelation that Ammu holds the key to duplicating immortality ties directly to the earlier discovery that Sanjeev himself is immortal.

• ammu
• arjun
• immortality
• genetics
• daughter

Arjun is a physician obsessed with the pituitary gland and the possibility of halting aging. He successfully perfected immortality on himself and his brother Sanjeev, but failed to replicate the effect on others. His research involves performing brain surgery on subjects to alter their pituitary function, resulting in the dark room full of tonsured patients.

Foreshadowing: The recurring dream of brain surgery foreshadows Arjun's experimental procedures.

• arjun
• immortality
• pituitary
• brain surgery
• experiments

The man who looks exactly like Sanjeev and abducts Ammu is not explicitly identified in the film, but he appears to be either a subject of Arjun's experiments or a deliberately placed decoy. His existence reinforces the theme of duplicate identities and may have been used by Arjun to create confusion and draw Sanjeev into his trap.

Foreshadowing: The presence of a Sanjeev double foreshadows the larger mysteries surrounding identity and experimentation.

• double
• clone
• abduction
• ammu
• kidnapper

Officer Vishnu is killed by Arjun when he tracks Sanjeev to the forest house. Arjun murders Vishnu to prevent him from interfering with his plan to capture Ammu for his experiments. Vishnu's death occurs during the confrontation at the forest hideout before Sanjeev defeats Arjun.

Foreshadowing: Vishnu's pursuit of Sanjeev throughout the film builds toward this tragic confrontation.

• vishnu
• death
• killed
• arjun
• police

Sanjeev lies about having no recollection of his past to protect his family and preserve his new life with Pallavi and Ammu. Revealing that he is Ashwatthama, a former terrorist, and an immortal would endanger them and destroy the normalcy he has built. Inspector Yuvraj suspects the connection to Arjun's family but cannot prove it.

Foreshadowing: Throughout the film, Sanjeev's pursuit of his past conflicts with Pallavi's warnings about endangering their family.

• identity
• lie
• ashwatthama
• yuvraj
• secret

Arjun survives the fire and watches the press conference from the shadows, scarred but determined. He carries a file on Ammu and vows to continue his research, implying that the pursuit of immortality is not over and he will return to claim her for his experiments.

Foreshadowing: The fire at the house represents a climactic defeat but not a final one, as Arjun's obsession with immortality exceeds his concern for his own survival.

• arjun
• survive
• ending
• threat
• immortality

Sanjeev's recurring dream of a dark room where brain surgery is performed on a tonsured patient is a repressed memory of his own experience at Arjun's laboratory. The dream contains fragments of the experiments that gave him immortality, surfacing as his memories gradually return.

Foreshadowing: The dream serves as the primary foreshadowing device, eventually leading Sanjeev to discover the truth about his past.

• dream
• brain surgery
• memory
• repressed
• tonsured