Bring Her Back is a 2025 Australian horror film directed by Danny and Michael Philippou and written by Danny Philippou and Bill Hinzman. The film stars Billy Barratt, Sora Wong, Jonah Wren Phillips, and Sally Hawkins. The plot follows two step-siblings who find themselves orphaned and placed in the middle of an occult ritual by their new foster mother.
Bring Her Back was theatrically released by Sony Pictures Releasing International in Australia on 29 May 2025. The film received positive reviews from critics and grossed $39.1 million.
Plot
After finding their father dead in the shower, 17-year-old Andy and his partially sighted step-sister Piper are sent to live with Laura, an eccentric former counselor who also fosters a mute boy named Oliver. Laura's daughter Cathy, who was also blind, died by accidental drowning in the backyard pool. Andy becomes unsettled by Laura's behavior and Oliver's strange demeanor. Laura begins subtly undermining Andy's mental state, suggesting he is unfit to care for his step-sister.
At their father's funeral, Laura tells Andy it is custom to kiss the body of the deceased on the lips. While alone in the chapel, Laura steals a lock of hair from their father's body and later tells Andy that some believe the soul lingers in a corpse after death. That night, Andy shares that their father was abusive toward him but affectionate toward Piper, causing Andy to resent him. Laura reflects on Cathy's death, saying she would give anything to hear Cathy call her "mum" again.
The next day, Andy attempts to bond with Oliver. Aware that he is mute, he asks him to start writing on a notepad in an attempt to communicate and offers him chopped rockmelon as a reward. Oliver proceeds to write, but then starts violently gnawing on the knife Andy used to cut the rockmelon with. A panicked Andy finds that Oliver has scrawled the word "Bird" on the now blood-soaked notepad. When Andy tries to carry him across Laura's encircled property line to get help, Oliver begins to convulse and scream, uttering the words “help me.” Laura arrives, takes Oliver to her room, and calms him by rubbing his head in a circular motion. He reluctantly returns to his mute state. Laura then feeds him the lock of Andy's father's hair. That night, Andy attempts to shower but is interrupted by Oliver, whom he hallucinates as his father's apparition, which warns him, "She'll die in the rain." In his shock, Andy slips and is concussed.
While Andy recovers in the hospital, Laura takes Piper to a padlocked shed, where Cathy's corpse is stored in a freezer, and dresses Piper in Cathy's clothes. It is revealed that Oliver is possessed by a demon called Tari, which Laura summoned through an amateur occult resurrection ritual learned from a Russian VHS tape. The corpse of the person to be resurrected is fed to a possessed host, who then regurgitates the corpse and its lingering soul into the newly dead body of a person killed in the same manner as the one to be resurrected. Laura intends to drown Piper in the pool during a rainstorm to mimic Cathy's death and use Oliver as a vessel to complete the ritual, but is still awaiting the perfect moment, though Tari is growing increasingly restless and hungry.
Upon Andy's return, Laura sprays herself with his cologne and punches Piper while she sleeps, blaming the assault on Andy. Laura accuses Andy of being abusive like their father, provoking an altercation between the two. Andy leaves, and Laura takes Piper to goalball practice so that she will be out of the house while Laura prepares for the ritual.
As Tari's hunger escalates, Oliver trashes the house, bites Laura, and consumes inanimate objects and parts of his own body. Meanwhile, Andy goes to the foster agency and learns that "Oliver" is actually a missing child named Connor Bird. He convinces Wendy, the social worker who sent Andy and Piper to live with Laura, to investigate, insisting Piper is in danger. Andy phones Piper, leaving a voicemail in which he warns her about Laura and reveals the truth about their father’s abuse. Laura intercepts the message and, hearing Wendy’s voice in the background, cleans the house in order to deceive Wendy during the visit. Wendy notices Laura's bleeding arm and, after Wendy questions the injury, Laura hysterically claims she can resurrect Cathy. Wendy and Andy then discover Oliver eating Cathy's corpse. They attempt to escape, but Laura runs them over with her car. Wendy dies upon impact, and a severely injured Andy is then drowned by Laura in a rain puddle.
Laura retrieves Piper and brings her home. Having eaten some of Andy's flesh, Oliver now speaks with Andy's voice to lure Piper. Suspicious, Piper locks herself in the bathroom and finds Andy's body. Laura breaks in and explains the ritual to Piper, who attempts to flee but accidentally knocks herself unconscious. Laura carries Piper to the pool and begins to drown her while Oliver watches. As Piper struggles, she screams out “mum,” causing Laura to release her. Piper escapes to the road and is rescued by a passing couple. Oliver makes it past the circle boundary and collapses as Tari leaves his body, while police arrive to identify him. Laura, overcome with guilt, carries Cathy's partially consumed corpse into the pool and cradles it as police officers surround her.
Cast
Billy Barratt as Andy, a guilt-ridden and traumatized 17-year-old boy
Sora Wong as Piper, Andy's visually impaired younger step-sister
Stephen Phillips as Phil, Andy and Piper's deceased father
Mischa Heywood as Cathy, Laura's deceased 12-year-old daughter
Production
In April 2024, it was announced that Danny and Michael Philippou (known as RackaRacka) were developing an original horror film follow-up to Talk to Me, with producers Samantha Jennings and Kristina Ceyton at Causeway Films. The film had Sally Hawkins attached to star and A24 was handling sales for distribution worldwide.[7] The Philippou brothers originally planned to direct a film adaptation of Street Fighter in 2023, but exited the film to focus on Bring Her Back, inspired by psycho-biddy horror.[8][9] The script was written by Danny Philippou and Bill Hinzman,[10] and it was produced by RackaRacka with financing from the South Australian Film Corporation and Salmira Productions.[11]
In late May, Billy Barratt, Jonah Wren Phillips, Sally-Anne Upton, Stephen Phillips and Sora Wong joined the cast of the film.[12] In an interview with People, Wong stated that she had "zero experience with acting", auditioning after her mother discovered the casting call on Facebook.[13]
Bring Her Back had a special screening for Adelaide Film Festival club members on 26 May 2025,[18] before being released in cinemas in Australia on 29 May 2025 by Stage 6 Films. It was released on the following day in the United States by A24.[19] It was released in the United Kingdom on 1 August 2025.[20]
Reception
Box office
As of September6,2025[update], Bring Her Back has grossed $19.3 million in the United States and Canada and $19.8 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $39.1 million.[6][5]
In the United States and Canada, Bring Her Back was released alongside Karate Kid: Legends and was projected to gross $5–7million from 2,449 theatres in its opening weekend.[21] The film made $3.1 million on its first day, including $850,000 from Thursday night previews. It went on to debut to $7.1 million, finishing in third.[22]
Critical response
Sally Hawkins' performance as Laura received unanimous acclaim.
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 89% of 256 critics' reviews are positive.The website's consensus reads: "A domestic nightmare that draws its most profound scares from Sally Hawkins' deranged performance, Bring Her Back is an exemplary chiller that reaffirms directors Danny and Michael Philippou as modern masters of horror."[24]Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 75 out of 100, based on 39 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews.[25] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B+" on an A+ to F scale, while those surveyed by PostTrak gave it an 80% overall positive score, with 57% saying they would definitely recommend the film.[22]
Monica Castillo from RogerEbert.com gave the film 3 out of 4 stars, writing that it is "perhaps more chilling—if slightly less focused—than their breakout feature debut". Castillo noted the film's fast pace and shocking moments, but criticized the VHS segments as being an "unnecessary scare tactic". She praised the performances of Hawkins, Barratt and Wong for their emotionally-deep performances and the film's sustained tension, but ultimately wrote that it did "not meet the high watermark of the brothers' first outing."[26] Jeanette Catsoulis of the New York Times acclaimed the "sublime lead performances" with particular praise for Barratt's performance as Andy. Catsoulis also praised the film's visual shock value and emotional weight, but called it "more logically muddled than its predecessor".[27] David Fear of Rolling Stone wrote that the film is a strong follow up to Talk To Me, boasting a "superior grasp of pacing and catch-release tension". Fear also praised Oliver's character as rising above "the whole creepy-youngster trope", having derided it as being "overused and lazy in most cases".[28]
A review by Sammie Purcell from Rough Draft Atlanta praised the practical effects and upsetting nature of the film, but "it doesn’t earn the depth of emotion it wants to achieve." Purcell praised Phillips' performance as Oliver for being "one of the film’s best and, oddly enough, manages to offer a little bit of humor in an otherwise bleak narrative." She further writes that "it’s hard to balance really effective emotionality with the type of viscous storytelling the Philippous appear to be interested in", having found the mix of grotesque visuals and emotional themes to be ineffective.[29] Barry Wurst from HollywoodinToto was far more critical, giving the film one and a half stars. Wurst wrote that he found the film's violent scenes far too intense, criticizing it as being "desperate for attention." However, he gave high praise to Hawkins' performance as being the "reason to see [the film]."[30]
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