After the Asian tsunami sweeps away her family, Parvati finds herself in Canada, trying to navigate a new life while living in an unfamiliar culture, with distant relatives she had never met before. She finds work as a hotel chambermaid, but it is alien and dislocating – until she begins a doomed love affair with a guest. As Parvati's new life begins to disintegrate, she finds one of her strongest anchors in Emily, a homeless young musician with whom she travels to Cape Breton to see the ocean once again.

Shot documentary style, Snow beautifully captures the sense of dislocation and melancholy that follows tragedy – and hints at the rebirth and renewal that can grow out of it.