Eeram

''Eeram'' () is a 2009 Indian Tamil-language horror thriller film written and directed by Arivazhagan in his directorial debut and produced by S. Shankar. The film stars Aadhi Pinisetty, Nandaa and Sindhu Menon. Saranya Mohan, Srinath, Lakshmi Ramakrishnan, and Krishna play supporting roles. The music was composed by S. Thaman in his debut Tamil film with cinematography by Manoj Paramahamsa and editing by Kishore Te.

''Eeram'' was mostly shot in Chennai, Srirangam, Tiruchirappalli and Pondicherry. The film was released on 11 September 2009 and became a commercial success. The film received critical acclaim for its theme, narrative, cast performance, cinematography, musical score, and direction. Over the years it has attained cult status. The Telugu dubbed version of the film titled ''Vaishali'' released on 27 May 2011, and was commercially successful as well.

Plot

The plot opens with water overflowing from an apartment at around 2:00 AM in Block E, which is seen by the apartment watchman. When he goes to inspect the source of the water, he witnesses a young woman Ramya ( Sindhu Menon) in the bathtub dead from asphyxiation. An investigation of her death is done by Assistant Commissioner of Police Vasudevan ( Aadhi), an honest and upright police officer who is also Ramya's former boyfriend. Although circumstantial evidence points it was a suicide, Vasu doubts its reliability and restarts the investigation of the events leading to her death.

The investigation reveals that Ramya was having an extramarital affair with an unknown person, and his frequent visits to her flat are confirmed by her neighbours in the building. However, Vasu is not convinced and sure that there is someone behind Ramya's death and names him Mr. X. He also remembers his love life with Ramya during their college years. Vasu was refused Ramya's hand in marriage by her father Shriraman (Rajashekar) as he was not willing to get his daughter married to a police officer. When Vasu asked her to elope and marry him, she refused, and they parted ways. Later, Ramya married wealthy businessman Balakrishnan ( Nandha).

Meanwhile, strange mishaps begin to take place in the apartment where Ramya died. Kalyani Subramanyam ( Lakshmi Ramakrishnan), who resides in the flat opposite Ramya's, dies by electric shock. An army veteran, Thiyagarajan (Boys Rajan), on his visit to Pondicherry, dies when an umbrella tip pierces his neck. The apartment watchman also dies a mysterious death. Vasu connects these deaths to Ramya but does not know how exactly. He finds that water is the common element in all the deaths. He appoints a few assistants to live in various flats of the apartment and inform him if there is any suspicious activity. The assistants point out a young man (Krishna) coming there to meet his girlfriend Deepa. Vasu identifies him as Mr. X and follows him to a theatre, but before he can catch him, he sees Mr. X banging his head into the restroom mirror. Vasu tries to stop him from killing himself, but an eerie spirit stops him from saving the young man. Vasu then sees human footprints walking on water and understands that it is the work of a supernatural entity.

The colour red and water keep appearing together as signals to Vasu that a murder is about to take place. He is unable to convince his superiors that the deaths are not accidental. Vasu investigates from a supernatural standpoint of life after death, and finds that a spirit can contact this world in any medium after the death and that it may also be through water. Vasu realises that Ramya's spirit killed everyone. One night, when Ramya's sister Divya ( Saranya Mohan) visits Vasu in his house to console him over Ramya's death, the latter's spirit possesses her and reveals the truth of her life after her break-up from Vasu.

Ramya lived happily with Bala but only for a short time. Bala disliked anything secondhand in his life. He could not digest his wife's past relation with Vasu and started to harass her. Ramya's maid complained of Thiyagarajan in another flat as he had been sexually harassing her. Ramya warned Thiyagarajan that if he repeated this, she would inform his wife. Ramya also advised Deepa to stop having a boyfriend (Mr. X) as it would ruin her life, and this earned her Deepa's dislike. Ramya's neighbour Kalyani wanted the flat where Ramya lived, for her daughter. Mr. X created an impression that he had come to visit Ramya to Kalyani. She had spun a false story against Ramya, and Thiyagarajan also confirmed it to Bala as revenge. Therefore, Bala killed Ramya and drowned her in the water to make it look like a suicide.

Hence, Ramya's soul killed Kalyani by electric shock; Thiyagarajan by the umbrella tip; the watchman who supported the false statement against Ramya; Mr. X by bashing him against the mirror; and continues to traumatise Deepa, which leaves the girl mentally unstable, yet she survives. Vasu informs Bala that he will soon avenge Ramya's death by bringing the truth of her murder by Bala to light. Bala's friend Vignesh ( Srinath) misguides him right from the beginning about the women's promiscuity. Vicky later gets killed by Bala himself as he threatened to reveal the truth. Bala is confident that he can be caught only if he confesses to the crime. One night, Bala kidnaps Divya and holds her captive in a car showroom. Vasu comes to save her and gets into a face-to-face combat with Bala. In the fight, Bala initially gains the upper hand, hits Vasu mercilessly with an iron rod on his head, and then stabs Vasu in his stomach with his own machete. Vasu then loses consciousness, but Ramya's spirit possesses him and gives him the upper hand to knock out Bala. Vasu succeeds in saving Divya, and then Ramya's spirit leaves him.

The following day, Bala suddenly confesses to his wife's murder, giving Vasu a reason to arrest him. In reality, Ramya's spirit had possessed Bala and made him confess the truth. After the press conference, while Bala is being taken to court, the sky's colour changes. It begins to rain, and petrol is shown to be leaking from the police jeep in which Bala is seated. Vasu sees a red umbrella with water dripping from it. The screen fades to black and the sound of a jeep crashing can be heard, implying that Bala was killed.

Cast

Production

''Eeram'' marked the directorial debut of Arivazhagan who was Shankar's associate director. Shankar himself produced the film.

Soundtrack

The music was composed by debutant S. Thaman. The audio rights was bagged by Think Music and Sony Music India. The songs were released on 9 August 2009. All lyrics were penned by Viveka.

The Telugu-dubbed soundtrack was released in 2011 by Aditya Music.

Reception

Critical response

''Rediff.com'' wrote "Debutant director Arivazhagan, who has written and directed the film, has turned out a horror/suspense film that strives to score points on logic, novelty and raciness. The best part is that he actually makes you cling to the edge of the seat most of the time. No mean feat, considering the limitations on mainstream Tamil cinema." ''The Hindu'' wrote "Arivazhagan must have polished his screenplay over and over again to come up with such a lucid narrative that strongly impacts the viewer. Only wish the attempt doesn't prove to be a flash in the pan. Because ''Eeram'' shows that this young director is worth looking out for."

Box office

The film released in 120 screens worldwide and was a sleeper hit at the box office.

Dropped sequel

After the success of ''Eeram'', Arivazhagan wanted to make a sequel as he had the story ready for it, but he turned down the idea to avoid getting typecast. A few days later, he chose to go with a different genre which was not related to ''Eeram'', as he felt he didn't want to limit himself solely to horror films.

See also

* List of ghost films
* List of horror films of 2009
* Gothic film – Notable films

References

External links

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{{S. Shankar

2000s ghost films
2000s horror thriller films
2000s Indian films
2000s supernatural horror films
2000s supernatural thriller films
2000s Tamil-language films
2009 crime thriller films
2009 directorial debut films
2009 films
Fictional portrayals of the Tamil Nadu Police
Films about uxoricide
Films directed by Arivazhagan Venkatachalam
Films scored by Thaman S
Films set in apartment buildings
Films set in Puducherry
Films set in Tiruchirappalli
Films shot in Puducherry
Films shot in Tiruchirappalli
Indian crime thriller films
Indian films about revenge
Indian ghost films
Indian haunted house films
Indian horror thriller films
Indian supernatural horror films
Indian supernatural thriller films
Tamil-language crime thriller films
Tamil-language horror films
Tamil-language Indian films