Man dies in cinema while watching The Conjuring 2 – and body goes missing

A 65-year-old man died in a cinema auditorium last week while watching a screening of horror movie The Conjuring 2.

The incident occurred at the Sri Balasubramaniar Cinema in Tiruvannamalai, a town in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. The cinema-goer, from Andhra Pradesh, had complained of chest pains during the film’s climax, and fainted shortly afterwards.

He was rushed to the nearby Old Government Hospital, where doctors pronounced him dead. Medics ordered his body to be sent to the Tiruvannamalai Government Medical College Hospital for post-mortem but, according to the Times of India, the cadaver, and the person charged with transporting it, have both gone missing.

While there are no doubt rational explanations for both the man’s death and the disappearance of his body, the story has fuelled a wave of supernatural panic on social media that has accompanied the film’s release.

A video purporting to show a woman who ”got possessed while watching The Conjuring 2” has been viewed close to five million times since being uploaded to Facebook last week, with many viral news sites in South East Asia reporting the “possession” as fact. However, the video in question is thought to have been filmed in 2013, long before the release of film.

Another viral Facebook post, from Singaporean man Damian Ng Yih Leong, shows a “cross” on a hotel room mirror the man claimed to have found after watching The Conjuring 2, which he describes as “my first firsthand encounter with paranormal activity.”

His post has been shared more than 2,700 at time of writing. Whether or not it was posted sincerely, the film’s makers are no doubt cheering the extra attention these social media reports are generating for the film, which received a two-star review from the Telegraph’s underwhelmed film critic Robbie Collin.