What happens to our soul after our death seems the most haunting question for humanity. It is a generally accepted concept that soul never dies where heart and brain does. If soul never dies, where it goes after leaving our body? It may wander around for some time to see if the body recover at any stage and when the hope ends it starts a journey to eternity to join the forces and to present again in another form. What if there are uncompleted missions the soul desperately needs to accomplish?
We all know that sound and light can be generated from electricity. We can change the form of energy. I also wonder at the magic devise called mobile, where a signal is passed through air and reach to another mobile anywhere in a particular country/location. Any heart surgeon will tell you that how he is depend on the nature to work, when he replace a moved heart. The doctor is helpless if the soul doesn’t responds promptly, which the soul usually do.
Cut to 13B, the newly owned flat of Manohar (Madhavan)and family. A joint family lives happily together. Sooner, Manohar realize that there is some other force which intervenes in their life. The entire family is happy because they get promotion, academic achievements etc., Manohar is in worry, where his picture when taken from the flat turned twisted and blurred, the lift doesn’t work forhim and nobody can nail on the walls and the milk always get spoiled when making tea. Add to the worry, exactly at 13.00 hrs a new TV Serial starts and at that time they cannot watch any other channel. The remote don’t work to switch the channel. Amazingly, the channel shows the story of a similar family the one he has with two brothers and their wives, mother and younger sister. Manohar, the young engineer decides to chase the secret of the things happening around him. Watch the movie on screen to know more about the wonderful thriller.
To begin with, the movie is less of a horror film in nature but a suspense thriller with continuous intervention from super natural elements. The film keeps the audience engaged from the beginning till the end and that is the secret of success for this good thriller. The story writing is not error proof. No. There are serious flaws in the screenplay, but the movie doesn’t permit you to think the minus points but move you forward with suspense waiting with each new frame. The writer should have taken a bit more seriousness where there are many situations and instances which contradict. Thankfully, the suspense in the movie was good enough to hide or ignore many such instances. The director’s effort need special applauds as he selected a different road to travel and comes out with a success note.
Murali Sharma manages to gives a reason to relax a bit. Assured of receiving an adult certificate, the director tempts the audience with the promise of some small piece of Thandoori and Kabab items in the film. Except few scenes like this, the movie is completely serious.
Madhavan’s performance in the movie is fantastic. He fit the role very well and his expressions simply fit the bill for the character. Neethu Chandra as wife of Manohar was excellent. Murali Sharma and Sachin Khedekar gave adequate performance. The director did a good job in getting the best out of his actors.
Cinematography by Sreeram was good in general and brilliant at occasion. However, the quality shots are not planned well it seems and there is overlapping of different formats to represent different time frame etc.
Editing was generally good. However, in two instances I thought it could have been better. There are at least few interchanged scenes in the second half (pre-climax to climax) and the first half should have been trimmed for better, avoiding the repetitive shots and that too for not less than 10 minutes.
Music and cinematography was pretty ordinary.
The major plus of the movie is the Suspense the movie provided and the thrill it generate when the scenes unfold. The film satisfactorily confuses the audience and prepares them self to accept the otherwise unacceptable idea of ghost infecting TV channels etc. Also it unfolds a story from past in the second half to satisfy the inquiries into the intentions of the spirit etc.
The major minus? The writer seems written it in two moods. The writer is confused and thereby the character of spirit and its nature were not consistent. In one scene they tried to say that the ghost lived in the flat, then freely permit it to stop lift etc. which is outside. In one scene the dog is afraid of the spirit infected person, where in another the dog is working for the spirit. In one thought they wanted to present a spirit which is inside the room but in another side as a spirit entered into a human body. Here, I think the writer only were creating some confusing scenes but failed in defining a clear character.
After adding the pluses and minuses, 13B is a good suspense thriller worth a watch. A very good attempt by the director Vikram K Kumar!
My rating: 3.5 stars