Manav Kaul’s brilliance in Baramulla: Netflix’s new thriller finds horror in memory, snow, written by Shanku Sharma

//Shanku Sharma//

There’s something about Manav Kaul that makes silence feel alive. It’s in the way his eyes seem to hold back an entire history before a single word is spoken. In Baramulla, Netflix’s new supernatural thriller, that silence becomes the film’s most potent language.

Directed by Aditya Suhas Jambhale and produced by Aditya Dhar, Baramulla places Kaul in the role of DSP Ridwaan Sayyed—a police officer investigating a spate of missing children in the icy expanse of Kashmir. What begins as a procedural quickly dissolves into something darker, almost spectral. As the investigation deepens, the line between haunting and history blurs.

Manav Kaul has always been drawn to characters that teeter on the edge—lonely men, intellectuals, dreamers, drifters. In Baramulla, he channels that interiority into a cop haunted as much by his own past as by the valley’s ghosts. Reviewers have called his performance “haunting,” “restrained,” and “devastatingly human.” He plays Ridwaan like a man whose professionalism is just a mask for his personal ruin.

What makes Kaul’s performance work is his refusal to dramatize pain. There’s no grandstanding, no cinematic breakdown. The grief sits quietly, like a shadow on his face. In a lesser actor’s hands, the film’s supernatural turns could’ve felt exaggerated. Kaul grounds it all, making even the strangest events feel inevitable—like memories returning home.

The film’s setting is not a postcard version of Kashmir. It’s cold, wounded, eerily still. Cinematographer Arnold Fernandes shoots the valley as if it’s remembering something terrible. Mist hangs low over abandoned houses; snow muffles screams; silence becomes a kind of accusation.

Unlike many recent films that use Kashmir as political backdrop, Baramulla turns it into a psychological space—a landscape of buried loss. The horror here isn’t just supernatural; it’s historical. Every gust of wind seems to carry echoes of displacement and grief.

At its core, Baramulla is less about ghosts than about guilt. The missing children mirror a deeper generational wound—the idea of an entire place losing its future. Ridwaan’s personal tragedy intertwines with this collective trauma, and through him, the film explores how memory itself can become haunted.

There are echoes of The Sixth Sense and Tumbbad, but Jambhale’s approach is more meditative. He’s less interested in jump scares and more in what it means to live with unresolved sorrow.

The film’s first hour is gripping—a mix of folklore, investigation, and slow-burning dread. The mystery unravels through whispers, diary entries, and eerie encounters that never fully explain themselves. But as several critics have noted, the second half becomes heavier with exposition and supernatural convolution. The mood remains strong, yet the narrative falters under its own ambition.

Still, even when the story wobbles, Kaul never does. His presence keeps the film anchored in emotion. You believe in his pain even when the plot starts to lose its balance.

Since its release, Baramulla has earned praise for its mood, visuals, and central performance. Some viewers found its pacing slow and its finale overwrought, but few denied its emotional power. It’s a film that aims high and, despite its flaws, hits something rare in Indian thrillers: the merging of genre and grief.

Social media reactions have been equally divided—some hailing it as one of Netflix India’s boldest films in years, others calling it “beautifully made but narratively tangled.” Either way, people are talking about it, and that itself is telling.

Baramulla isn’t an easy watch, nor is it meant to be. It’s the kind of film that lingers after the credits, not because of its scares but because of the sadness beneath them.

Manav Kaul stands at the center of it all—measured, magnetic, and quietly devastating. With Baramulla, he reminds us that horror doesn’t always scream. Sometimes it whispers through the snow.

Baramulla is perfect, it’s potent. A ghost story about memory, exile, and what it means to lose more than you can name. And Manav Kaul? He turns that loss into art.