Bring Her Back

Hawkins is up to the challenge, and the rest of the ensemble is strong enough to keep pace. But many of those story beats feel perfunctory; the film comes to life in the nastier, grislier set pieces.

The filmmakers want to jolt folks, for sure. But they also want to bring you to a place where the emotional after effects of that juddering linger long after the jump scares have faded away.

Hawkins’ performance is the rotten heart and spoiled soul of the movie, but the performances are great across the board, and stronger than usually seen in horror, be it of the “elevated” variety or otherwise.

Hawkins is a boundlessly talented actor, and it’s fun to watch her turn those powers to evil by playing a former counselor who understands children so well that she’s fantastically good at manipulating them in pursuit of her grand scheme.

In the devilish hands of Australian filmmaking brothers Danny and Michael Philippou, evil has been concentrated into an exceptionally and impressively nasty 104 minutes.

Despite its propensity for shock factor and supernatural child endangerment over narrative cohesion, “Bring Her Back” is fairly successful at dropping jaws.

In an era where movies about trauma are at the center of the horror conversation, Bring Her Back stands as one of the best in its genre.

... ghoulishly registers as a mediation on the madness of grief.

Filmmakers Danny and Michael Philippou could’ve left all the cult references on the cutting room floor and Bring Her Back would’ve been just as disturbing.


Bring Her Back starts off strong, drawing me into the characters and delivering some truly horrifying imagery. Unfortunately, the last 20 minutes completely unraveled everything that had been working for me up to that point.