Bring Her Back Review: A24's Horror Movie Is Not For The Faint Of Heart

YouTubers making the jump to movies don't tend to have the best track record, but the unsettling horror film "Talk to Me," directed by Danny and Michael Philippou from the RackaRacka YouTube channel, was a welcome surprise in 2023. While perhaps not the most thematically coherent of the many grief-based horror movies of recent years, it was original, energetic, and intensely scary — the sort of horror that leaves one feeling haunted after leaving the theater. Rather than cashing in immediately on their sleeper hit success with "Talk 2 Me," the Philippou brothers are following their debut with the even more terrifying original "Bring Her Back," which Danny Philippou and Bill Hinzman wrote at the same time as "Talk to Me."

As a work of filmmaking, "Bring Her Back" is in many ways an improvement over its predecessor — but whether it's preferable as a work of entertainment may prove divisive. The storytelling is patient and focused, sharing themes with "Talk to Me" while handling them with greater depth. It confirms the Philippou brothers' and casting director Nikki Barrett's gifts for discovering unknown young actors, while also giving Academy Award nominee Sally Hawkins the chance to sink into a juicy villain role.

The best and worst thing about "Bring Her Back" is how it goes even further than "Talk to Me" in both graphic gore and psychological terror. It is the scariest, most messed up film I've seen in a while. I laughed through the gore in the "The Substance," and even the uncanny thrills of "Longlegs" made me crack a smile, but "Bring Her Back" genuinely disturbed me. You can decide whether that's reason to see it as soon as possible or reason to stay far away.

After their father (Stephen Phillips) falls dead, 17-year-old Andy (Billy Barratt) hopes to be approved as guardian for his 12-year-old visually impaired half-sister Piper (Sora Wong). However, the siblings have to spend the months before Andy's 18th birthday in the foster care of Laura (Sally Hawkins), a social worker mourning her daughter Cathy (Mischa Heywood) and also fostering a traumatized nonverbal boy known as Oliver (Jonah Wren Phillips). The home is well-equipped for Piper's needs — Cathy was also blind — but there's something immediately troubling about the way Laura only seems to care about Piper for her similarities to Cathy ... and doesn't care for Andy at all.

Laura gaslights Andy, doing everything in her power to make him appear incapable of guardianship. She gatekeeps Oliver, prohibiting him from walking outside the chalk circle that surrounds her property and sure happens to resemble the imagery from those creepy cult ritual videos shown in the opening scene. And while "girlboss" might not be the right descriptor of her demeanor, she is a respected professional so trusted by all the adults around her that no one is going to believe how she's abusing the children in her care. That Laura's grief-based motivations are completely understandable only makes the lengths she'll go in order to achieve her goals all the more upsetting. She is the exact opposite of the friendly mother Hawkins played in the first two "Paddington" movies, and the actress goes all out committing to the role of this psycho-biddy turning her own pain into everyone else's problem.

The sibling relationship between Andy and Piper gives "Bring Her Back" its heart — and heightens its overwhelming sense of heartbreak. When providing visual descriptions for his sister, Andy will try to soften things to make them seem nicer than they are. Piper is perceptive about knowing when her brother's making stuff up day-to-day, but there are bigger secrets Andy has kept to keep her happy and safe, and these secrets start to make themselves known in face of their father's death. There were some similar ideas at play in the drama between Mia (Sophie Wilde) and her father (Marcus Johnson) regarding the death of her mother (Miranda Otto) in "Talk to Me," but I found the family secrets subplot here less predictable and more moving.

Putting children in peril is an easy way to provoke emotional reactions, and "Bring Her Back" takes this to the extreme in its third act. Remember that painful self-mutilation scene in "Talk to Me?" There's a scene with a kitchen knife in "Bring Her Back" that's somehow even worse than that. Applying such convincing gore effects to such young performers creates a deeply disturbing experience; one hopes the child actors made it through this production without being traumatized.

My press screening was followed by a Q&A with the Philippou brothers, and there was both whiplash and relief going from the dead seriousness of "Bring Her Back" to the goofy way its filmmakers present themselves. There are occasional moments of dark humor in "Bring Her Back" that attempt to counterbalance the film's overall heaviness (at the risk of profiling all Australians with ADHD, there's one moment in this film I'm 99% certain was inspired by a "Smiling Friends" gag), and there's even a drunk party scene deliberately evoking the more "fun" parts of "Talk to Me." But, even moreso than with "Talk to Me," the bleakness of this movie's conclusion overwhelms any other reactions one might experience throughout.

I think "Bring Her Back" felt more painful to me than "Talk to Me" in part as a reaction to its subject matter; parents abusing their power scare me more than teens making terrible decisions. Others' reactions might differ depending on their particular triggers, so it's best to be prepared. The feel-bad horror movie of the summer is here — take that as either recommendation or warning.

"Bring Her Back" opens in theaters on May 30.