Waiting

The story is set in contemporary India, within a hospital and its surrounding spaces during nights and days of heightened emotion. It reflects current medical practices and patient-family dynamics in a modern urban Indian setting. The timeframe centers on real-time decisions and the slow arc of coping with a loved one’s coma.

The events unfold in the coastal city of Kochi, anchored by a hospital where the waiting lounge becomes the crossroads of grief. The urban hospital environment amplifies the personal crises of the characters. Kochi's modern medical facilities provide a contemporary backdrop for intimate conversations about life, death, and choice.

💔 Grief

Grief threads through both Tara and Shiv as they navigate loss and uncertainty. The film highlights the five stages of grief, showing how anger, bargaining, and eventual acceptance surface in different ways for each character. It portrays grief as a shared, evolving process rather than a fixed endpoint. The personal journeys intersect in the waiting room as they seek meaning and support.

🤝 Companionship

An unlikely bond forms between Tara and Shiv, two strangers bound by shared pain. Their conversations in the waiting lounge become a refuge from the surrounding chaos, revealing how empathy can bridge age and background. The relationship evolves from clinical distance to a compassionate partnership that helps them face what lies ahead. The film suggests that human connection can aid healing, even in the shadow of death.

⚖️ Ethics

The narrative probes medical ethics and patient autonomy, contrasting hospital considerations with personal wishes. Decisions about surgery, life support, and withdrawal of care are framed against a backdrop of medical politics and insurance interests. Shiv and Tara advocate different approaches, highlighting the tension between realism and hope. The climax centers on who should guide a patient’s fate when the outcome is uncertain.