Intensity: 🩸🩸🩸🩸 out of 🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸
Directed by Danny and Michael Philippou
Written by Danny Philippou and Bill Hinzman
Bring Her Back is the sophomore horror feature effort from the Philippou brothers, who two years ago produced the surprise hit Talk To Me. I am happy to report that they have once again delivered a spine-tingling and intense thriller that will haunt your soul for years to come. Sally Hawkins provides a villainess for the ages, and the rest of the young cast become sympathetic pawns in a horrifying possession experiment. The movie is an excellent original story, but you need to be willing to sit through a slow, steady burn and withstand some savage gory moments.
The Philippou Brothers have done it again. 2023 was a gold rush of quality horror movies coming out of Australia, which included Evil Dead Rise, Monolith, Late Night With the Devil, and Godless: The Eastfield Exorcism; no movie made as much of an impact worldwide as Talk To Me. It was original. It featured heartfelt stories of young people dealing with possession as an addiction. And it was SCARY. The challenge was: could they repeat themselves without feeling derivative?
Yes.
I had avoided the trailers and promotional materials from this movie, not wanting to have anything spoiled. Honestly, though, I was expecting something akin to a sequel. It didn’t help that fellow Scariest Things partner Mike Campbell went with me and referred to it as Talk to Me Too. Nope! It isn’t that at all. However, Bring Her Back successfully tapped into the affection of the protagonists and placed our characters into a devious trap. The Foster Home.
Two teenagers, blind Piper and her big brother Andy, find their father dead in the shower after coming home from school. Though they had different mothers, the two step-siblings are close, with Andy being very protective of his little sister. Andy isn’t old enough yet to get custodial rights. To avoid being split up, Andy is willing to submit to what amounts to a probationary housing situation with the same Foster parent.
The Cast of Bring Her Back
- Sora Wong plays Piper, a mostly blind teenager who longs to live a “normal” life, but depends on her step-brother for guidance and protection.
- Billy Barratt plays Andy, Sora’s 17-year-old step-brother who has suffered abuse at the hands of their now deceased father. He is protective of Sora, but his checkered history has the social service workers wary of him.
- Sally Hawkins plays Laura, the foster mother assigned to Piper and Billy. She had a daughter, Cathy, of similar age to Piper, who was also blind. Her career as a counselor has developed a fondness and desire to help children with special needs. (Or so we are initially led to believe.)
- Jonah Wren Phillips plays Ollie, another foster child whom Laura is in charge of. Ollie is a mute and displays some erratic behavior due to the loss of Cathy. (According to Laura.)
- Sally-Anne Upton plays Wendy, the social worker who assigns Andy and Piper to Laura. She oversees the city’s foster care program.
- Stephen Phillips plays Phil, Piper and Billy’s father. We mostly see him in flashbacks and as a ghost, as his death instigates the Foster care conundrum. Phil was abusive with Andy, but gentle with Piper.
A Short Summary of Bring Her Back
Bring Her Back is all about family bonds, both for good and evil. Step-siblings Andy and Piper have a push-and-pull relationship built on trust and honesty, but there are old resentments and a history of anger management in their past. They need each other, and they love each other. But, like many teenage sibling relationships, they argue and tease each other. The duo is hit with the hammer blow of losing their father, and is placed in the care of the at-first energetic and eccentric Laura.
It is the perfect trap. Because of Piper’s dependency on care by someone with experience caring for a blind child, Laura should be a perfect fit. Too perfect, as it turns out. Laura has insidious plans to bring her daughter back from the dead using Piper as a vessel. Andy is a late addition to the Foster Home arrangement, and Laura does everything in her power to undermine the relationship between the brother and sister subtly. She manipulates, frames, and schemes to make Andy into a villain.
Unfortunately for Laura, she is going insane, and her dabbling with the occult has left her vulnerable to Ollie. Ollie is a wild card, and it is obvious from the moment we see him that he’s not all there. As Andy will describe him, “He’s a creepy little fucker.” We learn that he’s more than that, and all of Laura’s grand plans begin to collapse when Ollie devolves. He is not who or what we are led to believe he is. We are also aware of the unfortunate fate of Laura’s daughter, Cathy.
Where the story hangs in the balance is Piper’s trust, or lack thereof, in Andy. She can’t see the evidence in front of her, and Laura devilishly utilizes Piper’s sense of smell as a wedge between the teens. It’s brilliant, and truly wicked. There are so many ways that her plans can go wrong, but a storm is coming, and the time to execute her devilish plans has arrived.
Evaluation of Bring Her Back
Holy cats, this was an intense movie! The Philippou Brothers know how to milk tension from the screen. As a frame of reference, this movie is more akin to Hereditary or When Evil Lurks than Talk to Me. The interplay of family dynamics and the bonds of familial love and trust are on full display. Even, disturbingly, the same can be said about Laura and her “family.”
Warning! There are scenes in this movie that will mentally and emotionally scar you. There is a scene that will be forever known as the cantelope moment, which will be spoken in hushed tones by horror gore enthusiasts for decades. The veil of cowardice was in play for me at that moment. (Fingers covering my face and me peeking between them.) I had to turn away, and I don’t think I saw the entire scene. Think Audition. Just brutal. Other scenes have similarly “Holy Shit!” moments, and you’ll need a strong stomach and emotional fortitude to watch this movie.
Does that make you more likely to watch this, or less? Either way, you’ve been warned.
Something else worth noting: The film we saw was subtitled, even though it was in English. Perhaps there was a request from a deaf audience member. I’m not sure if this is a regular occurrence or not.
The Performances:
Two-time Oscar nominee Sally Hawkins is an acting treasure. From the jump, her energy and vibe, though friendly, are very off-putting. She owns every scene she is in, and her skill at transitioning from manic happiness to dazed confusion is inspiring. To have an actress of her caliber in a film like this is pure gold. Like Toni Collette in Hereditary, she deserves Oscar buzz for this performance. Will she get it? I doubt it. Horror snubs are as common as pennies in the dryer. She deserves it, though.
The rest of the cast is also outstanding. Billy Barratt is entirely believable as the dutiful and doubting brother. Laura does some truly dastardly things to make Andy vulnerable, and Barratt does a fantastic job of conveying his own confusion and the mental battle of solving this mystery. Sora Wong is making her film debut with this movie. She answered a call for blind teenage actresses, and she won the role, with only a single stage play in her acting background. She NAILED it. Wong is visually impaired, and there is no need to convince anyone of her blindness. It is a courageous performance, and I hope this leads to other opportunities for her.
Enter Jonah Wren Phillips into the all-time creepy kid pantheon. He belongs right up there with Milly Shapiro (Hereditary), Noah Wiseman (The Babadook), and Linda Blair (The Exorcist). Oh my Lord, I hope he doesn’t come out mentally scarred from this performance. What he does, and what he must have had to do for makeup, is unimaginable. There is a scene where he is chewing on the kitchen counter that is so disturbing, with him absolutely destroying his teeth. Groans from the audience were audible above the soundtrack. Oh… again… there’s that cantaloupe scene. Well done, Johnah. I hope you’re alright.
Concluding Thoughts on Bring Her Back
Sign me up for anything else that the Phillipou Brothers decide to do. I will declare them right now as masters of horror craft. They produced two horror movies that will go down as the most potent and important horror films of the Era. Sign me up for more Sally Hawkins! As sweet and demure as she was in The Shape of Water, she flips the coin, using some of the same tics and body language, but uses it this time for evil! Laura will go down as one of the best villainesses in the Horror Pantheon.
Having said all that, this movie isn’t for everyone. It isn’t “fun.” This is not a good time at the movies. But, it is a GREAT movie. It is bleak, and it tells an awesome tale. There is some ambiguity in the story. The climax of the movie, though powerful, is inconclusive. Did Laura succeed? Maybe? Also, did Laura set up Phil’s death, allowing her access to Piper? Maybe? Where did Laura get access to the horrific VHS summoning ritual tapes? Was Ollie a sacrifice for preparation for the Cathy/Piper swaperoo? It isn’t necessary to have answers to all those questions to tell the story successfully, but it allows your imagination to roll.
Bring Her Back is rated R for language and brutal, sadistic violence. Fortunately,the MPAA recognized the quality of the film and allowed it to be released as an R and did not slap it with an NC-17. You can currently see this A24 production in theatrical wide release. The movie performed well enough at the box office that it may be in theaters for a couple more weeks, but Hard-R movies don’t often last long in the cineplex. See it now while you have a chance. This is not a movie suitable for children. Please don’t bring them. Find a babysitter. Older teens who can handle some extreme violence, perhaps, would appreciate this, but I would also caution against that, too. You don’t cheer for the violence in this movie. This is not Friday the 13th or Terrifier.
Review by Eric Li
Grapefruit.
Andy and Piper’s code word for honesty
