A brother and sister uncover a terrifying ritual at the secluded home of their new foster mother. A film by Danny Philippou & Michael Philippou, starring Billy Barratt, Sora Wong, Jonah Wren Phillips, Sally-Anne Upton, Stephen Phillips, Mischa Heywood, and Sally Hawkins.
BRING HER BACK
Danny Philippou • Michael Philippou
(2025)
After their father Phil’s sudden death, Andy (Billy Barratt) and his blind step-sister Piper (Sora Wong) discover his body in the shower. Social worker Wendy (Sally-Anne Upton) wants to split them up and send them to separate foster homes. Piper is assigned to Laura, a former counselor and longtime friend of Wendy’s.
However, Andy pleads with Wendy not to separate them, arguing that he’s afraid foster parents won’t be able to properly care for Piper. Wendy tells Andy he can apply to be Piper’s guardian when he turns eighteen in just three months. Andy begs Wendy to ask Laura to take him as well. Given Andy’s history of violent behavior when he was younger, Wendy is reluctant but agrees to ask Laura.
Andy drives Piper to Laura’s secluded home after Laura agrees to take them both in. Andy and Piper have a secret code word “Grapefruit” which they use to indicate that they are being honest and telling the truth to each other.
At Laura’s home, they meet Oliver (Jonah Wren Phillips), a foster boy who Laura claims is mute since Cathy’s death. While Piper can’t see what Oliver looks like, she learns about his appearance from Laura’s descriptions. Laura reveals that her blind daughter Cathy passed away after drowning in the swimming pool.
That evening, Oliver talks to his friend via messages and reveals that he thinks Andy is a weirdo. When Oliver is distracted, Laura grabs Oliver’s phone and reads his messages, causing Oliver to become agitated and violently snatch his phone back, as if Laura had planned to make Oliver angry and lose his temper. Laura appears frightened by Oliver’s behavior, apologizes, and leaves his room.
At their father’s funeral service, Laura secretly cuts a lock of hair from the body. After the service, Laura forces Andy to return to his father’s coffin to say goodbye, asserting that it’s tradition and claiming that some believe the soul stays in a corpse for months before moving on. When Laura asks Andy to kiss his father goodbye on the mouth, Andy becomes reluctant and ultimately refuses to do so. Laura kisses the body on the mouth instead.
Meanwhile, at Laura’s home, Oliver breaks the glass window and escapes from Laura’s locked bedroom. He roams around the premises, which appear to be inside a large white circle drawn on the ground.
If you’re a fan of horror films, you probably realize that the white circle is typically for keeping the people inside safe from evil forces or trapping something inside.
Knowing about Andy’s traumatic past, Laura executes her plan to undermine him, making him unfit to be Piper’s guardian. She pours her urine on Andy’s pants while he’s sleeping. She secretly goes through his phone and deletes a photo of Oliver. She wears Andy’s body spray and hits Piper’s face while she’s sleeping to make Piper think that Andy is responsible.
After multiple attempts to avoid showering because he can’t shake the image of his father’s body on the bathroom floor, Andy eventually takes a shower. While he’s in the bathroom, his father’s ghost (Stephen Phillips) appears and warns him that Piper will die in the rain.
The film reveals that Laura has discovered a dark cult ritual that can transfer a dead person’s soul into a new body using a demon. A demon trapped within Oliver works as a temporary vessel to transfer Cathy’s soul into Piper’s body. To complete the ritual, Piper must die in the same manner as Cathy.
BRING HER BACK is an intriguing supernatural horror film directed by Australian twin filmmakers Danny and Michael Philippo, with a screenplay by Danny Philippo and Bill Hinzman.
The story follows two step-siblings who become orphans after their father’s sudden death. They’re placed in foster care with a grieving woman who has recently lost her own daughter and discovered a way to bring her back through dark occult rituals.
While the narrative lacks the twists and surprising elements that made their directorial debut TALK TO ME such a phenomenon, the film features deeper emotional aspects and stronger character relationships. The imagery also feels more visceral and terrifying, building tension as the story unfolds.
There are several truly unsettling scenes, such as the scene where possessed Oliver bites a kitchen knife and the scene where he bites a wooden tabletop until his teeth break and begins chewing his own flesh.
Billy Barratt, Sora Wong, Jonah Wren Phillips, and Sally Hawkins deliver stellar performances, with Billy Barratt particularly standing out as Andy. His portrayal makes viewers feel invested in his backstory and root for him to survive the impending tragedy.
Sora Wong is an Australian actress who made her professional acting debut as Piper in BRING HER BACK. Born with coloboma and microphthalmia, conditions that leave her with limited vision, Sora was cast despite having no prior professional acting experience after her mother discovered a casting call for a visually impaired girl on Facebook.
BRING HER BACK is, without a doubt, one of 2025’s best horror films.
BRING HER BACK was theatrically released in Australia on 29 May 2025, by Sony Pictures Releasing. The film was theatrically released in the United States on 30 May, by A24.
