The Last Order is a lockdown short that tries to grapple with and unravel a facet of the unprecedented, perplexing circumstances
we’re in. 
The film chooses a subject that evokes pity from all of us – lockdown birthdays. Whether you’re
an introvert or not, the thought of being forced to spend your birthday all alone, shut away from the world, is a unanimously
dreaded thought. 
A woman orders a food delivery on her birthday and doesn't pay heed to the safety measures. Such an oversight might be familiar for some of us for it is easy to give in to the false security of the pandemic not harming us, and that it won't hit us if we’re inside our house. However, soon
after, strange occurrences begin to happen one after the other in her life. Shadows and lights are employed to invoke an atmosphere of thrill and foreboding, raising the question at the heart of the narrative - will ordering food from outside during a pandemic prove to be a point of no return for the protagonist?

The Last Order | Short Film of the Day

The film does a notable job of conjuring an environment of tension right from the word go, involving the viewer deeper and deeper as events begin in unfold in the protagonist's life. When a blind woman finds herself locked inside a house in an empty building, things go downhill at a breakneck speed. Unable to reach out to anyone for help, her fate of entrapment only offers an imminent bleak turn of events to the audience. While the handling of the subject matter exhibits potential, along with a skilled performance by the protagonist, there are a few questions inherent to the narrative whose answers are never provided. For instance why do neighbours, whose manner of addressing suggest intimacy, all empty the building without checking on their blind neighbour who lives by herself, how come days pass by without a concerned friend, albeit in a different city, finding some way to follow up on her, especially when he had last spoken to her in a moment of crisis? The premise also loses point for uniqueness since the subject matter has already found access in mainstream Bollywood. The freshness of it all could have come forth in the execution and portrayal which indeed comes across as a zealous effort, irrespective of the aforementioned concerns.

Ekaki | Short Film Nominee

The film allows its plot to develop in the vein of a psychological thriller. The story serves as a relevant metaphor for a world where we increasingly find our physical freedom curbed and our lives confined indoors. It portrays the same using the entrapment of the protagonist within a space that is marked by endlessly disappearing doors.

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