Aranmanai 2014

In a quiet village, Ayyanar leads a small band to clean a palace whose owners intend to sell the property, setting a tense mood from the start when a night-time fright drives the palace cook to vanish in fear of a supernatural presence.

The next day, the scene widens as the estranged Eshwari returns with her husband Kesavan and their son Muliankannan, joined by her older brother and his daughter Maya. They all gather with the aim of selling the palace to Ayyanar, while Paalswamy sneaks into the palace disguised as a cook to uncover a photo that would prove he is also an heir, so he can claim his share.

Strange occurrences begin to mount as Madhavi senses something off. She witnesses a servant’s daughter speaking with a mysterious girl named Selvi, a figure no one else seems able to see, and the girl’s mother explains that Selvi is mentally impaired. The misfortunes continue: two other servants vanish, and the sale hangs in the balance while the family prolongs their stay.

To get answers, Ravi, Madhavi’s elder brother, arrives at the palace with Maya’s help and they decide to document the happenings, setting up cameras around the grounds. When they review the feeds, they glimpse a worker retreating from an unseen danger before the feed abruptly cuts out. A local fortune teller who witnesses this chaos flees in terror and later explains that a woman possessed by a vengeful spirit has been at work. He hands Ravi an egg that spins whenever the possessed person is near, and it twists to life near Madhavi, deepening the mystery. The little girl’s persistent references to Selvi push Ravi to dig deeper.

As the tale unfolds, Ramya shares the backstory that ties Selvi to a larger history in the village and its temple. Selvi’s past unfolds: years earlier, Murali fell in love with Selvi, a girl who often becomes the vessel for a goddess and predicts the future. Though she cares for him, their different social circumstances complicate matters, and when he asks to meet her that morning, Selvi intends to join him but vanishes before she can reach him. The tension between love, fate, and social boundaries threads through both past and present.

In the present, Ramya reveals that Selvi’s apparent mischief masks a graver truth: Ayyanar and his accomplices had stolen temple jewels and replaced them with fakes. When Selvi touched one of the counterfeit jewels, she received a flash of forewarning and confronted the culprits, who attacked her and buried her inside the palace to keep their crime hidden.

Selvi further explains her plan to Ramya: she intends to live on with Murali inside Madhavi’s body. If Murali and Madhavi become intimate on a sacred day, no one can expel Selvi from Madhavi’s form; but if they fail to consummate, she will kill Murali so they can be together in death. Faced with this dire choice, the trio seeks a path to separation: a powerful emotion to awaken Madhavi or a river-side ritual that would unleash an energy capable of laying Selvi to rest. The palace residents disrupt Selvi’s attempts to bring Madhavi and Murali together, while Ravi works to move Murali toward the river without alerting Selvi, who remains a constant threat.

As the pursuit heats up, Selvi attempts to seize control by putting Murali into a trance, hoping to locate Ayyanar. The priest and Ravi try to guide Murali toward the river while keeping Selvi contained, but Selvi crashes back, triggering a chase that ends with Ravi’s car overturning and plunging into the river. Selvi closes in on Murali, and the danger intensifies as she tries to drown him, but a crucial reveal—Madhavi is pregnant—briefly jolts Madhavi back to herself and alters the course of events. The ritual at the river finally completes, severing Selvi’s possession, and Madhavi regains her senses just as Murali and Madhavi reunite.

In the end, Ravi finds a new connection with Maya, and the couple’s bond is celebrated among the group. They share a final photograph in front of the palace, yet a close, zoomed-in shot of a ghostly figure moving near a palace window hints that Selvi’s presence might linger, suggesting she has returned to the palace in some form.