But I don't know if I can wholeheartedly embrace or recommend Bring Her Back. I came out of the film quite affected by it but more depressed than scared. It's not a fun horror movie, dealing with heavy subject matter, but I felt no catharsis from watching it, only worn down, even as I praise the craftsmanship that went into it.
Have I gone soft, or is the movie too strong for me? Maybe some parts hit too close to home.
After the death of their father, stepsiblings Andy (Billy Barratt) and Piper (Sora Wong) move in with Laura (Sally Hawkins), a former counselor grieving the loss of her daughter in a drowning accident. Andy, almost 18, wants to take guardianship of Piper, who is visually impaired, but he must prove to their social worker he's fit and he has moved on from a violent childhood.
That's hard enough, but Laura blatantly favors Piper, her actions consistently inappropriate and strange. She's up to something, and it has something to do with her foster son Oliver (Jonah Wren Phillips), a mute, seemingly feral boy.
Many horror films in recent years have been about grief and trauma, using the terrors of ghosts and monsters as a metaphor for very real human emotions. I'm not sure if we can consider Bring Her Back similarly allegorical or metaphorical. Grief is the driving motivation and defining characteristic of the three main characters. It's not subtext; it's text.
Bring Her Back might have operated on a more ambiguous note, along the lines of something like Rosemary's Baby, in which we're not sure if something nefarious is actually afoot or if the main character is paranoid and imagining. Instead, Bring Her Back makes it quite clear that Laura is working against Andy and Piper, using gaslighting and manipulation tactics to drive a wedge between and make everyone (including Andy himself) believe he is losing his mind and possibly dangerous. It creates a lot of dramatic irony; we see what Laura is doing and all the mistakes the siblings make in trusting her, hoping they'll see through the lies and get help or escape.
But there's also an overtly supernatural element involving Oliver, whose behavior begins odd and alienating and only becomes increasingly disturbing and graphically upsetting. One scene in particular, when Oliver and Andy are left home alone, is gruesome and difficult to watch, involving a knife being used in a way it was never meant to be (I don't mean stabbing someone). The truth behind Oliver and his condition is not frightening but also heartbreaking.
Bring Her Back is an intense blend of domestic paranoia and the supernatural. The kids are all convincing in their roles, and Hawkins, playing against the type, is all too believable and scary as a woman who abuses, both physically and psychologically, vulnerable children. One of the most unsettling - and unfortunately credible - revelations is that she used to work as a child therapist and knows how to manipulate the system to insulate herself from people who would otherwise try to help the children she tortures.
As the movie continues, the metaphorical screws tighten. We can see Andy is running out of time to make outsiders believe him and to save Piper from what Laura has in mind, but everything he does only reinforces the reality Laura is shaping.
This all comes back to my original point: Bring Her Back is effective and well accomplished at what it does. Perhaps it succeeds too well. I came out of watching the movie emotionally drained, depressed, almost battered. I admire the craft and skill that went into it, but I'm in no rush to revisit it anytime soon.
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