I recently found myself rewatching Yaavarum Nalam (I saw the Hindi version though, known as 13B outside Tamil Nadu), a film I first saw when I was much younger. I had only vague memories of the plot, but as soon as the flashback is explained, everything started clicking back into place. It’s fascinating how our brains store these memories - while I couldn’t recall the exact storyline beforehand, each scene triggered vivid recollections of how I felt watching it for the first time. The film doesn’t rely on the usual horror tricks; instead, it weaves tension through moments that feel disarmingly normal until they’re not.
There’s something masterful about how the film creates dread without ever fully showing its ghost, letting our imagination do the heavy lifting. While Tamil cinema largely went down the horror-comedy route after this, I can’t help but wish we had more films like Yaavarum Nalam. It’s one of those rare horror films that respects its audience’s intelligence while still managing to genuinely frighten them.