Vayanadan Thamban is a 1978 Indian Malayalam-language horror film directed by A. Vincent and produced by S. Hariharan a Director of Radio Advertising Services, starring Kamal Haasan and Latha .

The film was dubbed in Tamil-language as Kanni Vettai and later Hindi-language as Pyasa Shaitan with added scenes by director Joginder.

[6] The plot starts in a period set in the early 19th century, in a ruined fortress of an old feudal warlord, Vayanadan Thamban who is in the fag end of his life.

The men of the Tharayil family seek the whereabouts of the mysterious prince and come to know that such a man or place doesn't exist.

As years passed, Thamban identifies his next target, Nabissa, a daughter of a rich Muslim trader, Kannamparambathu Koyambadu Haji, whom he saw at a railway station (signifies that time has moved to an age when commercial trains started).

Hearing of this, Koyambadu Haji and his men with guns rush to hunt for the mysterious young man.

They also learn from tribals that an old man rode in a horse cart with a young girl, so both assume, it's some black magician who inflicted damage to their family.

However, as a devoted Christian, she felt suspicious about the voices of devils inside and escaped from him by flashing her cross.

Thamban seriously fell in love with Annamma, thus his devil lord Karimurthy started warning that he was losing patience.

Anna gave birth to a daughter and she put her in a boarding school to avoid speaking on details of her husband.

The current generation of the Tharayil family and Abdulla in his old age are still keeping in good relations to gather any information on the mysterious man.

By now, India was under British rule and Malabar Police was investigating on missing of this tribal girl, which came in local newspapers.

This brings Abdulla and Tharayil Kurups to meet the parents of the missing girls and understand the modus operandi is very similar.

The old Members of the Tharayil family as well as Abdulla also confirm their identity, thus they all realize, they are all searching for one man, not multiple magicians, etc.

Karimurthy now gets angry with Thamban, thus he absorbs all his energy and his body gets rotten down instantly to his original century-old decay condition.

Vogue described it as one of the first examples of the "bits technique", where filmmakers shot ‘hot’ scenes separately and left them out of the versions sent to the censor board for clearance, which would be inserted into the projectors at opportune moments.