'Bring Her Back' - Trauma, Abuse and Circles.

Josh
Jun 7, 2025
5 min read

Updated: Jun 17, 2025

Danny & Michael Philippou (2025)

Not a Pilippou brother movie if a child isn't getting horribly mutilated

We finally have the hotly anticipated follow up film to the Philippou brothers (Danny and Michael), Talk to Me (2022), with, Bring Her Back. Talk to Me was a hit I don't think anyone was expecting. Even being a fan of their work on the RackaRacka YouTube channel, whenever you hear that a YouTuber is making a movie, the seed of what to expect automatically gets planted in your head. Normally they’re poorly written but try to get by with the excuse that it’s a YouTuber movie. Or they look bland and flat like a cheap TV show, but try to get by with the excuse that it’s by a YouTuber. The actors are mostly friends of the star in question and it feels like a poorly done SNL skit but it tries to get by with the excuse that it’s a YouTuber movie. The pain points for these movies have no end. Yet I can’t think of another example of YouTubers breaking this mould, to the point where I hear their names and think of them as directors and not YouTubers, than the Philippou brothers. And for crowd pleasing elevated horror, they’re batting two for two.

Like, Take to Me, Bring Her Back, is centered around a couple of Aussie youths, brother and vision impaired sister, Andy (Billy Barratt) and Piper (Sora Wong) dealing with grief following the sudden death of their father (Stephen Philips). Without a legal guardian, both are sent to a foster home, with foster parent Laura (Sally Hawkins) with strange foster sibling, Oliver (Jonah Wren Philips). And slowly it’s unrevealed that Laura is following video tutorials from a strange cult, in order to bring back her late daughter, and take over the body of Piper. Full spoilers, ahead.

What is done so well, is the drip fed information and openness to the backstory… until they feel a need to explain the themes. We’ll get to that. Tape tutorials on how to revive a loved one are vague on the details. We have this eerie handheld hand recorder with an unknown language over the top commentating on what’s going on but we only get mild details later on in the film. Which is great because I was expecting to get the scene where Laura sits down and explains what she’s doing and what the outcome will be. Instead, it’s brief, one liners that we’re able to piece together. For her this is a twisted way of dealing with grief, or more accurately, avoiding having to deal with it. By taking in Piper, she did so to essentially replace her also blind daughter who drowned. And as a trained counsellor, she pushes Andy to try and express his feelings towards his Dad. Reluctant at first we assume it’s just because he's doing the man thing of not showing emotion. And in an uncomfortable scene we see the brilliance behind Sally Hawken's performance, although kind, she keeps pushing Andy to say goodbye to his father as he couldn't even look at him in the casket. She whispers for him to look and kiss the corpse, it's those subtleties that elevate her character to someone more malicious than misunderstood.

It's subtle maliciousness that flows between the guardians in the movie. As above the distance Andy had for his father is used as a way to show him trying to be strong for his sister. He talks about his younger self displaying disruptive behaviour as a way to get attention from his father, as his focus was on his sister. And with the fathers death occurring in the shower, Andy struggles to use one. The sound of running water sends him into a trance. The shower being one of many motifs centered around water, his actions are re-contextualized with the revelation of abuse from his father. Where he would run the shower so his sister wouldn't hear, his abuse is hidden from plain sight. Paired up with his sister literally being blind to it all, there's a façade at play from the parent and child to the public. This mirrors his relationship with Laura.

Laura with her own past of having a blind daughter who drowned, again water coming back, she favours Piper. While she emotionally manipulates Andy in some pretty twisted ways in order to get him to lash out. His sister is none the wiser. Also heavily used to the point where it's almost like a game of Where's Wally's, are circles. Use in the ritual to bring someone back, turning in a motion like trying to rewind time. Circles to represent life never ending. The cycle of abuse and emotional immaturity from a parent to child. There’s enough here that would be to dissect on a second viewing.

While their decisions seem purposeful, even when watching the commentary for Talk to Me you can hear the boys call out subtle motifs and themes, I do wish they would have faith in their audience to pick up some of these. The themes were unrevealing themselves nicely and legitimately took twists that I didn’t expect. Yet there is a small moment, although emotional, Andy was spelling out the theme of abuse to Piper. Also what I felt missing compared to Talk to Me was the energy in the camera movements. When the people were getting possessed and passing around the hand the camera would track exaggerated movements of characters and was full of energy. Not poorly shot but the youthfulness from their YouTube days and previous movies was not there. Continuing from Talk to Me was their child characters going through intense violence. The visual effects were so good, from subtle gore effects to large scale car crashes, these guys pulled it off flawlessly. And watching in a packed theatre was a treat listening to everyone squish and squirm through some of the intense scenes.

What hurts most about this is the thought that they have Talk 2 Me and a Talk to Me prequel in the works. I want them to continue to take on these different horror concepts. And fill it with all the Aussisims we see here from tapping their side mirror back to their car, opening a door with a butter knife and the specific music choices. I hope they don’t get stuck in the trap of making sequels to their biggest hit *cough David Robert Mitchell *cough It Follows *cough Under the Silverlake is an amazing movie and should get more credit than it got and is well worth the watch *cough.