Danny and Michael Philippou’s “Bring Her Back” is their first film since “Talk to Me” (2022) and exactly the follow up that someone can get away with when they’re left alone and have the goodwill of their first film.
This is a truly nasty piece of work, a take-no-prisoners horror movie, which makes me sound like I’m recommending it.
I’m not.
Billy Barratt and Sora Wong play Andy and Piper, a brother and sister who are forced to move into foster care after their father dies. They are brought to a home located deep in the woods, owned by a cheerful, quirky and doting mother figure named Laura (Sally Hawkins).
Laura seems too good to be true, though we are shown time and time again that there’s something horrific about her that Andy and Piper are initially unaware of.
The story is an obvious contemporary update of Hansel and Gretel, though referencing Hans Christian Anderson may suggest this is a fantasy or fable (or akin to Oz Perkins’ great 2020 “Gretel and Hansel”), which it isn’t.
It begins with fuzzy, ghastly footage from an old videocassette tape, and the imagery makes the cursed video from “The Ring” look like “Sesame Street” in comparison.
The freak-show qualities of the plot eventually drown out the humanity. I was ready to tap out early on but stuck with it because of Hawkins’ stunning performance, which finally succumbs to Horror Movie 101 in the last stretch.
RELATED: THIS ’80s DOC CAPTURES REAGAN-ERA SHOCKERS
I believed that Laura is behaving like a monster because she cannot handle living in a world without her daughter and will never get over her death. On the other hand, the supernatural material is harder to swallow, let alone fully grasp, as that grainy video footage is the only explanation we’re provided to justify one unpleasant spectacle after another.
How rough does this get? For starters, mutilation, cannibalism and child abuse. Most horror movies are violent, but this one goes out of its way to shock in ways to I found distancing and, frankly, desperate for attention.
The reason to see this is Hawkins’ performance, which has layers and innovations that the screenplay doesn’t always address.
Back for seconds with Danny & Michael Philippou for new horror BRING HER BACK starring the legendary Sally Hawkins. https://t.co/2zqhoBhB9b
— A24 (@A24) April 30, 2024
The filmmaking is skillful, particularly in the cinematography and use of sound. Despite how well this was made, I would never watch it again and can’t think of a single person I’d recommend it to.
When a film frequently resorts to depicting child abuse, it’d better have a damn good reason to lean into something so horrible. Little kids being pummeled is the least of the atrocities depicted here.
The subtext is what grief does to us, especially in isolation. I can appreciate that but “Psycho” (1960), arguably the greatest movie ever made about isolation and escalating madness, didn’t need to resort to being this sick just to get a reaction from audiences (even Alfred Hitchcock had lines he wouldn’t cross).
Fans of hardcore, envelope-pushing horror might be thrilled that A24 is putting something this gruesome in mainstream theaters. Cinephiles likely know that there are better films that tackle this material without having to resort to gross-out imagery and repulsive content to shake up an audience.
FAST FACT: “Talk to Me” earned $91 million at the global box office in 2022. The film’s budget? A reported $4.5 million.
If you’re among those who need their horror film extra spicy and unsafe, I recommend Francois Ozon’s French horror film “See the Sea” (1997) and Nicolas Pesce’s Portuguese, nightmare-inducing “The Eyes of My Mother” (2016); the former film is around 50-minutes long, while the latter is in black and white and runs 77-minutes.
Those brisk running times underline how effective one can be with less time to waste. Both films shook me to my core and are among the most extreme, if well made, horror films I can think of.
I saw “Bring Her Back” with a friend of mine who loves genre films as much as I do, though she noted that I was visibly shaken and unhappy when the film ended. I asked her if she liked the movie and she offered an interesting response: “When I hear the words Horror Movie, this is the kind of film, and the kind of experience, I think of.”
It’s a good point and genre fans may celebrate how firmly the directors wallow in the muck for this outing.
View this post on Instagram
The thing about the most disturbing works from David Cronenberg or Takashi Miike, for example, is that the horrific imagery illustrates the ideas, themes and potential for violence in the characters. The screenplay for “Bring Her Back” is too half-baked and routine to justify how repellent this is.
The brothers Phillippou are talented and ambitious filmmakers, and I hope their next movie is closer to the tonally balanced and darkly funny “Talk to Me” and not an attempt to go further than “Bring Her Back” in making audiences reach for a vomit bag.
In fact, if A24 had been a hair cleverer in their marketing for this movie, they would provided “Bring Her Back” Vomit Bags with each ticket purchased. If it sounds like I’m trying to keep you from seeing this, then take this review as a warning.
For everyone else, who thought “Final Destination: Bloodlines” was a horror movie for wimps, here’s something with a lot more kick that’s majorly sick.
One and a Half Stars
A24 seems to be trying to push the envelope as far as they can just because they can. Some of their recent releases are real head-scratchers.