Logline
On an American college campus Anisha, recently arrived from India, starts school with her traditional beliefs in love, sex and friendship intact. Savitri, her Indian-American roommate and friend, doubts love and rather prefers the anonymity of the casual encounter. Together they meet Kevin, an exchange student from the Outer Hebrides of Scotland, an encounter which will change all three.
With the first snow fall on an American college campus Anisha, 20, recently arrived from India, begrudgingly dances with her roommate, Savitri, at a rowdy co-ed anti-frat to the pulsing sounds of 80s synth pop. Overwhelmed and homesick Anisha leaves the party. Savitri remains, slipping outside to cool off. On the back porch Savitri meets Kevin, 20, a Scottish exchange student from the Outer Hebrides. Savitri and Kevin bond. Back at the dorm Anisha is still up, reading poetry by Tagore. Anisha confesses that she doesn’t like parties and longs to have a friend who doesn’t like dancing. Nevertheless, when Savitri receives an invitation from Kevin to a “Burns Supper,” a party celebrating the birthday of the great Scottish poet, Robert Burns, Anisha agrees to go. Savitri introduces Anisha to Kevin and the three of them talk till dawn. The idyll of their friendship, however, is soon interrupted when Savitri becomes sexually involved with Kevin. This upsets Anisha whose personal sense of virtue conceives of sex without love to be immoral. Savitri dismisses Anisha’s view as absurd. When later Anisha questions Kevin about the encounter, her engagement with him is more indirect. Kevin’s feelings for Savitri intensify causing a skittish and commitment-averse Savitri to break up with him. Feeling confused and heartbroken Kevin takes solace in his friendship with Anisha. That she and Kevin are both from “across an ocean” deepens their bond, blurring the boundary between friendship and romance. At an open mic poetry event Anisha recites an ode of her own composition in which she publicly avows her love for Kevin. Later in Kevin’s room Anisha tells Kevin that she is in love with him. Kevin tells Anisha that he has strong feelings for her, too, but that he is in love with Savitri. A devastated Anisha takes off. On campus Anisha runs into Savitri who accuses her of being in love with Kevin. Anisha readily concedes the truth, that she feels “true love” for Kevin, and not the “garbage” Savitri feels. A frustrated Savitri tells Anisha that she was in love once but an agonizing break-up from her past makes trust difficult. Anisha doesn’t care and walks away. Savitri finds Kevin and confesses to him that she is afraid of him, of making herself vulnerable to him. Kevin tells Savitri that he is not interested in her fear, only in her capacity to risk it all for something real. The school year ends and Savitri agrees to travel with Kevin across an ocean to the Outer Hebrides for the summer. At the same time Anisha decides that America is not for her. She returns to India, to the surety of her home, her family and what she knows with the hope of healing her wounded heart.