Set in a rural town in Thailand, Await tells the story of a lonely and depressed man who discovers that whenever he is on the brink of death, he sees a gorgeous woman who is a ghost. He and this ghost form a bond that leads from friendship to something more, but at what cost? 

Await

Tum , a visibly depressed and broken 39 years old man, a sci-fi movie writer, who’s stuck writing Thai soap operas and gay series. He’s an extreme introvert and has a serf-centred view about the world. He grew up poor raised by a single mother, who passed away a year ago. Her passing set him off into his darkest depression. He tried committing suicide on a regular bases unsuccessfully, which caused him to lose his job and long term girl-friend. Tum, who’s in a downward spiral, is waiting for someone to fill in his void, and lift his pain away, like what his dead mother always did for him.  

One day Tum sleep-drives along a damp road after drinking and taking pills. He jolts up after hitting a bump on the road. Tum, injured from breaking instantly, goes out to investigate and discovers blood on the front of the car. He freaks out and tries to drive away, but the car won’t start. Tum runs to the nearby town to ask for help. There, he finds an old Thai-Chinese lady who works at a convenience store. She helps drive him back to the site of the crash and calls insurance for him. At the site of the crash, Tum is shocked to discover that there’s no blood in his car. Later, while Tum is at an old clinic in the town getting his wounds looked at, he receives a call telling him that his car would take an entire week to fix. On his way out of the clinic, he catches the attention of a beautiful nurse. The old lady who helped him out earlier tells Tum that he can stay at one of her vacant houses. Later that evening, Tum heads to the local convenience store from before and buys some basic necessities, which to him are liquor, cigarettes, and painkillers. He also purchases a rope. At the house, Tum shuts off the phone, drinks some liquor, then brings out the rope he bought from earlier and hangs himself with it. As Tum starts feeling the life fade out of him, he notices a gorgeous woman. 

The very moment he sees her, he halts his suicide attempt and puts the noose away. For some reason, he is highly drawn to this woman. The looks at him with a neutral expression, then walks away. He follows her to the door he’s tried to fix since he moved into the house. She fixes the door, but says nothing, then disappears. Confused, yet intrigued, Tum starts searching for the identity of the mysterious woman around the town. Unfortunately, nobody recognizes her at all. Tum realizes that the reason he saw the woman was because he was on the brink of death. Back in his rented house, he tries to hurt himself again just to see her, and attempts to communicate with her further. She shows up, but is still hesitant to talk to him. He is persistent, and she finally responds to him as they both begin their strange relationship. 

Message

“Await” explores the concept of one hopes and dreams awaiting endlessly for something that may never come. The key message of the movie is imprinted in the ending of the story, where each character ended up back to where they started stuck in a never ending loop of life awaiting for the unknown. Throughout the movie we see two characters, although one ghost and another human, questioning each others existence and turning an innocent friendship into something more. Sex between a man and a female spirit challenges space and time quantum physics, pushes boundaries and raises questions of the what if. However, right after they have sex, the story turns sideways. When Tum finally decides to kill himself permanently to be with her, all of a sudden the spirit of the girl gets sucked back into her own body and now awakens from a coma. The story then starts again with her point of view, travelling to the same town that she sees in her dream. Same car broken down, rented out the same house in the middle of no where. She proceeded to kill herself questioning her worth and existence, then Tum appears as a ghost but they can’t remember each other. The movie ends suggesting that the same inevitable loops will keep going, where the two await for each other eternally like two circles that may never collide.  

The movie explores the concept of being in denial of death and immortality. Most people are busy juggling with external and spiritual aspects of life to stay sane and fulfilled. That way they won’t be forced to face with unanswered questions or disappointment. The story gives an example of a couple that started out not conforming to the norm asking questions, looking for non tangible things that the world can’t partake. But in the end, they conform to love, a basic human need. They can’t really run away from genetics human desires and basic human evolution. We are all controlled by mother nature and conform to it one way or another. In the end, the film will raise questions and challenges circle of life of human nature to be in denial of death. 

FEATURE FILM

GENRE               Romance, Drama, Horror

LENGTH           90 minutes

KEYWORDS    Erotic, Sensual, Moody