Are you willing to give up a part of yourself and your culture to fit in with others and avoid getting bullied by your peers like Sam or would you rather get bullied before giving up your culture? What if you have no other choice but to accept the culture you rejected to save the life of your best friend after an evil spirit latches itself on your best friend?
Directed by Bishal Dutta, the American supernatural movie titled “It Lives Inside” focuses on a similar storyline with Sam being the protagonist rejecting her East Indian culture to fit in with her peer at the new school. Things take a turn after an evil spirit latches itself on her bestie and she has no other choice than to accept that part of her culture to fight the spirit latched on her best friend.
Betty Gabriel playing Joyce’s role, Vic Sahay playing the role of Inesh, Gage Marsh playing Russ’s character, and Jenaya Ross playing the role of a Pishach in the lead. Released on September 22, 2023, the American horror film had a run time of 99 minutes and did amazingly well at the box office with a collection of $5.8 M.
Viewers felt that the film had a nice horror element with a compelling strong card by Bishal as it has a strong core of the social message.
It Lives Inside: Ending Explained
The film starts with Sam, an American high school student of East Indian origin trying to fit in the Western society, and her mother desiring to keep her connected to her East Indian origin roots and continue to follow the traditions and pay respect to her culture, while her father doesn’t care for what she does with her life.
Once in her new school, Sam rejects her culture to fit in with her friends, who are white, while having a budding romantic relationship with Russ, her classmate. Sam has grown apart from her former best friend Tamira, another Indian student, to fit in with her white friends, who have now grown to be the high school’s outcast due to her carrying a glass jar and acting aloof with her peers.
Tamira’s and Sam’s teacher is concerned with her behaviour and tries to ask Sam for help, but she refuses due to her belief that Tamira is fine and is doing things to gain the attention of her peers.
The following night, Tamira feeds the glass jar raw meat, but something unreal in the jar starts to damage the meat, and Tamira asks Sam for help by telling her about the supernatural entity living in the jar being the one they were told about as kids and has started to terrorise her after approaching her at school but instead of helping her friend in need, Sam smashes the glass jar as she feels embarrassed by Tamira’s behaviour.
It is revealed that Tamira has been abducted and held captive by the supernatural entity which attacks her before mutilating her, while Sam starts noticing a strange presence surrounding her that leads her to take a look into Tamira’s claim. Meanwhile, Sam’s mother grows frustrated with her disregard for their Indian traditions especially after Sam decides to go out and spend time with Russ instead of attending the special prayer kept to request Tamira’s safety.
Sam and Russ decide to escape and go to an abandoned house to spend time together and as it turns out the house belonged to Karan, another Indian student who was killed alongside his family. The duo find drawings of an unreal creature on the walls before strange occurrences start to increase, while Tamira is attacked by the supernatural entity daily, and her plans of escape are always foiled by the creature.
Sam and Russ have their first kiss at Karan’s house after the two decide to revisit Karan’s house and things take a drastic turn after Russ gets attacked outside of Karan’s house by an invisible entity and is killed by him right in front of a terrified Sam.
Sam starts losing grip on her sanity and starts to suffer from daily nightmare due to the trauma she holds after Russ got killed. Desperate to find Tamira, Sam seeks help from their teacher Joyce, to decipher the Sanskrit texts from the notebook she took from Tamira’s possession.
Did Sam Become The New Vessel?
After deciphering texts from the notebook, Joyce finds out that the scriptures were about Pishach, a demonic entity which feeds on negative energy before consuming the soul of its prey, and the only way to stop a Pishach is to seal it inside something like the glass jar, Tamira used to carry. After Sam learns about the origin of the Pishach, she seeks help from her mom to lure the supernatural entity out and save Tamira.
Meanwhile, the mother-daughter pair prepares food before donning traditional Indian attire while Joyce gets attacked by the entity at the school and ends up getting injured. Sam’s dad arrives home while the preparations to lure the Pishach are going on only to get attacked and injured by the supernatural entity.
The film ends with a year being passed since Sam became the vessel for the supernatural entity, and everyone has a good time as the family has managed to control the entity by feeding raw meat to its vessel Sam. The film has an open ending as the moment Sam consoles Tamira and assures her about the Pishach never getting out she starts to bawl her eyes out. Sam’s crying indicates the pain she endures while trying to contain the supernatural entity and prevent it from escaping.
