Aranmanai, scary and fun filled

The name Aranmanai (Palace) may not exactly conjure up images of creepy figures with long hair or dark, dingy places, but from the movie’s poster alone, one may come to expect this.

Well, the 150-minute movie, is certainly filled to the brim with all of these and more.

The movie sets the scary mood up straight away as it depicts a haunted palace that has all the elements to scare such as large spaces, enourmous doors, cobwebs and low lightings, which its owners want to sell-off.


The sale requires all the ancestral property heirs’ signatures and most of the main characters of the film including newlyweds (Hansika Motwani, Andrea Jeremiah, Lakshmi Rai, Vinay Rai, Kovai Sarala, Mano Bala, Sundar C, Nithin Sathya) ends up in the same house.

Santhanam joins the family as a cook, in a bid to get a share from the house sale.

Strange things begin to happen to those in the house as one by one, the servants in the house mysteriously disappear and the family members begin noticing a figure appearing around the house.

This is made worse by scenes of the maid’s daughter, who talks to an imaginary friend called ‘Selvi akka’.
Suspecting something amiss, Sundar C, who plays the role of Andrea’s brother, learns that his sister is haunted by a vengeful spirit.

The movie reminds viewers too much of Chandramuki.

Hansika appears when the movie is almost halfway through, in a part that recollects how and why the haunting and killing happened.

As most of the horror action comes from the haunted Andrea, her performance naturally stands out from the other two ladies.

Some scenes of the movie were freakishly scary that audiences were screaming from the top of their lungs.
Director Sundar C balanced the scary factor with a generous dose off hilarity and comedy.

Santhanam, as usual, had the crowd in stitches especially during a scene in which he boasts that he is not afraid of ghosts but ended up getting bashed from Andrea.

However, the movie has too much skin show for a horror flick, where in some scenes, it seems entirely unnecessary for such expose.

For a first attempt at the horror-comedy genre, director Sundar C, does not disappoint.

Here's a sneak peak.