Shaitaan

Vikas Bahl's film is the Hindi remake of the 2023 Gujarati production Vash. A father, played by Ajay Devgn, drives his family to their farmhouse outside the city; on the way they meet a stranger played by R. Madhavan, and once he is inside the house he begins to establish control over their daughter. The horror comes from obedience rather than the supernatural. The girl, played by Janki Bodiwala, acts outside her own will while remaining conscious, and her parents watch from inside the room, able to do nothing. Bodiwala played the same part in the original Gujarati film. That the stranger is never fully explained works in the film's favour; Madhavan plays him as courteous rather than menacing, which is where the discomfort comes from. It opened on 8 March 2024, took two hundred and eleven crore against a budget of sixty to sixty-five, and had the second-biggest opening for a Hindi film that year. Who it is for: viewers who like Indian horror and single-location suspense. Who it is not for: anyone who will struggle with a threat narrative built around a child.