It Lives Inside (2023)

Samidha, or "Sam", is an Indian-American high school student who has been assimilating into western society. While her mother, Poorna, is insistent that Sam continue to follow traditions and pay respect to her heritage, her father, Inesh, is less strict towards her. At school, Sam tries to reject her culture to fit in with her white friends and has a budding romance with her classmate Russ. As a result, she has grown apart from her former best friend and fellow Indian student, Tamira, who is now a social outcast for acting withdrawn and carrying a strange glass jar. This concerns their teacher, Joyce, but Sam believes Tamira is fine.

At night, Tamira feeds the jar raw meat but something inside the jar starts damaging it. The next day at school, Tamira privately approaches Sam for help, claiming that a supernatural entity from a story they were told as children actually lives in the jar and has been terrorizing her. Sam, embarrassed and frustrated by Tamira, smashes the jar open, causing Tamira to have a panic attack. When Sam leaves to get help, Tamira is attacked by an invisible entity and goes missing. Sam feels guilty and begins to fear there is something sinister going on. She recovers a notebook Tamira had in her possession containing strange Sanskrit writings.

Tamira is revealed to have been abducted and held captive by the entity, which attacks and mutilates her. Sam begins to notice a strange presence around her and takes a second look at Tamira's claims. Meanwhile, Poorna grows more frustrated by Sam's disregard for Indian traditions, especially when she skips a special prayer for Tamira to hang out with Russ. Sam and Russ go to an abandoned house that belonged to another Indian student, Karan, who died alongside his family in a supposed murder-suicide. The pair discover drawings depicting a creature on the walls. The strange phenomena escalates, unnerving Sam, while Tamira suffers from daily attacks and fails an escape attempt.

Sam and Russ visit Karan's house again where they kiss. Outside, he is attacked and killed by the entity in front of Sam. A traumatized Sam starts to lose her grip on reality and suffers from frightening nightmares. Desperate for help, she convinces Joyce to help her decipher some of the notebook's texts. Joyce identifies the texts as being about a demonic spirit known as a Pishach, which feeds off negative energy before consuming the souls of its prey. The only way to stop the Pishach is to seal it inside something like a jar. Sam asks Poorna for help, who plans to lure out the Pishach. As the pair prepare food and don traditional Indian attire, Joyce is attacked at the school and badly wounded by the entity.

Inesh arrives home, only to be attacked and injured by the Pishach. It also attacks Poorna before being warded off. Sam realizes that Tamira is being held at Karan's house and races to the property to save her. Inside, she is attacked and stalked by the entity, which reveals its true form to Sam. Sam finds Tamira and confronts the entity. Realizing she can be the vessel to hold the Pishach, Sam allows it to enter and inhabit her body.

One year later, Sam has dinner with Tamira, Joyce, Poorna and Inesh, who have all recovered. The group have managed to contain the entity by feeding Sam raw meat, much like Tamira did to the jar. Later, Sam and Tamira reconcile. As Sam assures Tamira that the Pishach will never get out, she gradually begins to look more and more worried until she starts to cry.