SUBSTITUTION: BRING HER BACK

Fear Scale :⭐⭐☆☆☆

My rating: 4/10

Press Rating: 7,3 / 10

(Based on IMDb, Letterboxd, and AlloCiné)

Year:2025

Duration:1h39

I initially stayed away from the film Bring Her Back, hesitant to watch it despite all the buzz surrounding its release. Eventually, I was convinced, because everyone presented it as one of the most significant horror films of the year. Unfortunately, to my great disappointment, the film did not meet my expectations at all.

One of the positive points is that I knew nothing about the story, which allowed me to let myself be carried along. The first twenty minutes intrigued me and immediately created a sense of mystery: you can feel that something is wrong, but you don’t yet know exactly what. However, very quickly, the film becomes excessively predictable. Within the first thirty minutes, you can almost guess the entire outcome and how the story will unfold.

I don’t want to play the “know-it-all” because that almost never happens, but here, I found the events too obvious. Several spoilers are revealed very early SPOILERS-Oli is obviously not the expected child, the antagonist tries to make Andy seem insane to drive him away, and it quickly becomes clear that her attachment to Piper is linked to the loss of her own daughter, and that she will probably try to find her through Piper. In the first part of the film, she even watches videos on how to transfer a lost soul into another body, so one wonders how it will all end…

The film also lacks real suspense and gets lost in irrelevant subplots. For example, the trauma related to the father’s death contributes nothing to the story and seems like an artificial addition, a frequent trend in recent horror films. Many scenes add little, as if the directors had too many ideas and tried to fit them all into a 1 hour 40 minute film, which results in a messy outcome.

The characters are poorly written and often badly acted: Sally Hawkins overacts throughout the film, the two main protagonists have no chemistry, and Piper is particularly irritating.-SPOILER-the death of the brother is completely rushed. Piper is extremely foolish throughout the film, being blind does not make you that stupid, she prefers to believe a woman she’s known for only a week rather than her own brother. I have a lot of trouble with characters who cause their own downfall through their foolishness. The ending is, in addition to being predictable, full of narrative shortcuts: a young blind girl manages to fight an older woman and a demon for no reason, the antagonist suddenly accepts her daughter’s death, and by chance, a couple passes by at exactly that moment to save her.

The only positive point: Oli’s character is brilliantly portrayed, bringing tension and creating the only truly memorable scenes of the film. I also thank the film for not resorting to jump scares and trying another type of horror element.

So honestly, I think you understand, I did not enjoy this film at all. I generally have trouble with the Philippou brothers, who had already made Talk to Me in 2022, which I found completely awful. Watch it anyway, because honestly, I think it is a film that could be appreciated for its perspective on grief, which may interest some. Personally, I didn’t connect with it, and its predictability, as well as its clichéd and unbearable characters, really prevented me from having a good time.