Cineworld had been teasing us for a while with Bring Her Back, the new horror film from the brothers who brought us Talk To Me, so after seeing the trailer several times, I was excited and looking forward to seeing the movie.
Bring Her Back has taken a good while to hit the screens in the UK. The film was released in May in the US, and cinema-goers still have to wait until July 26th. But thanks to Cineworld, we got to see the film a little earlier.
The supernatural horror film directed by Danny and Michael Philippou is very much about grief and loss as orphaned step-siblings Andy (Billy Barratt) and his visually impaired sister Piper (Sora Wong) are sent to live with their eccentric foster mother, Laura (Sally Hawkins), and her mute foster child, Oliver (Jonah Wren Phillips).
Turning to an occult ritual, Laura’s aim is to bring her daughter back, and Piper is the key to her need to have her beloved daughter back, no matter the cost.
The film is slow and at times delivers some unnerving and cringe-worthy moments; even the opening sequence is somewhat an uneasy scene to watch. I wouldn’t say that there are scares, but there are several moments that shocked me more than made me jump. Look out for Oliver’s hunger taking hold in the kitchen; it had me squirming (which takes a lot for me to do).
Sora Wong is great as Piper, and Billy Barratt has some moments that he portrays well, but for me, it’s Sally Hawkins who steals the scenes. Her performance as Laura is worth seeing Bring Her Back for; the way she moves through the film, with her character being somewhat eccentric at the start to a grieving mother filled by desperation for her daughter’s return, is an excellent watch.
There is something just not right with their foster mother, and as the film slowly moves along, we learn of her loss and what it has caused her to do to try and come to terms with losing her daughter.
Bring Her Back is shot well and looks great on the big screen, but the film just lacks that little something that pulls you in to want to know how it’s all going to turn out in the end.
Sadly, the trailer made Bring Her Back look more terrifying than it is. Yes, it has some gory moments, but it’s certainly more a thriller than a full-on horror, but it will still give you chills in several scenes.