Grief Without God: Bring Her Back and the Terror of Lost Hope

Coming into 2025, Bring Her Back was one of my most anticipated films of the year. It was made by the Philippou brothers, the directing duo that burst onto the scene with the 2023 breakout hit Talk to Me, and if you’ve seen that movie, you know why I was so excited for the pair’s sophomore feature. Talk to Me is one of the best horror flicks of this millennium, so of course I couldn’t wait to see what the Philippous would do for an encore. I was sure the brothers would knock it out of the park once again, and now that I’ve finally seen Bring Her Back, I’m happy to report that it does not disappoint.

Bring Her Back was directed by Danny and Michael Philippou, and it stars Billy Barratt, Sora Wong, Jonah Wren Phillips, and Sally Hawkins. In the film, Andy and Piper are siblings who live with their father. They appear to lead a fairly typical suburban life, but their entire world gets turned upside down one day when they find their dad dead in the shower. Since the kids are both under eighteen, Andy and Piper have to go into foster care, and they end up in the home of Laura, a tender woman with a tragic past of her own.

She lost her young daughter some time ago, and she currently houses a mute foster child named Oliver. At first, this seems like a perfect place for our teenage protagonists to work through their grief and trauma, but in typical horror fashion, Laura isn’t quite as loving as she seems. Not long after we first meet her, concerning cracks begin to appear in her warmhearted veneer, and it soon becomes clear that she’s harboring a grisly secret that just might cost Andy and Piper their lives.

Before I say anything else, I have to let you know that Bring Her Back isn’t the kind of fun popcorn horror that casual fans typically expect from this genre. In fact, “fun” is just about the last word I’d use to describe it. Bring Her Back is grief horror in the vein of Hereditary, Midsommar, and The Dark and the Wicked, and just like those movies, this one will hit you like a ton of bricks.

Instead of jump scares every few minutes and an endless stream of overused cliches, the film takes a more measured and atmospheric approach to its grim subject matter. It’s saturated with the kind of disturbing creepiness that seeps into your bones and stays with you long after the credits begin to roll, so even when nothing overtly horrific is happening on screen, the implications of what might be lying just beneath the surface are more than enough to send shivers down your spine.

This is slow-burn horror at its finest, but I don’t want you to get the wrong idea. Unlike some of its cinematic peers, Bring Her Back is more than mere insinuation and suggestion. When things go south for the characters, this movie gets very gory, and there were a number of scenes that made me literally squirm in my seat. It’s that gruesome, but perhaps surprisingly, the blood and guts are almost never gratuitous. Aside from a couple of brief shots, the carnage always serves a clear narrative and thematic purpose, so it feels like a natural part of the story rather than an inappropriate exercise in senseless violence.

In a word, this film is the best of both worlds, but like all truly great horror, it doesn’t get by on its scares alone. It’s rooted in believable characters brought to life by amazing performances, so let’s talk a bit about the major players in Bring Her Back.

First up, we have Sally Hawkins. She plays Laura, and if you’re familiar with her work, you won’t be surprised to hear that she’s fantastic in this role. From the moment you first meet the woman, you totally buy into her warm, affectionate demeanor, but you can’t help but think there’s something not quite right with her. She almost seems a bit too nice, and that’s largely due to Sally Hawkins’s subtly nuanced performance.

You’ll feel a similar way about Billy Barratt and Sora Wong, the actors who play Andy and Piper, but without the sinister undertones. These two performers are just incredibly likable, so you can’t help but instantly fall in love with their characters. They ground Bring Her Back in a sense of genuine humanity, so when things start to go south for the siblings, you’ll naturally start rooting for them to make it out alive.

Rounding out the main cast, we have Jonah Wren Phillips, the kid who plays Oliver. He doesn’t get to do much talking, but he doesn’t have to. He exudes a nearly tangible aura of creepiness just by standing still and staring into space, and no matter what Oliver does, Phillips never falters. He even nails it when he finally gets to show some real emotion, so I can’t wait to see where this kid’s career goes from here.

Last but not least, I have to say a few words about the deeper themes of Bring Her Back. As I mentioned before, this is grief horror, but it’s a very specific kind of grief horror. Without spoiling anything, I’ll just say that it’s about the dangerous lengths people sometimes go to in order to ease the seemingly unbearable pain of losing a loved one, and as a Christian, I can’t help but think of St. Paul’s poignant words of encouragement on this very topic:

“But we would not have you ignorant, brethren, concerning those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope.” (1 Thessalonians 4:13)

Beneath all the blood, guts, and fantastical scares, Bring Her Back feels almost like an extended meditation on that ancient teaching. Granted, this is by no means a Christian movie, but it forms something like a photographic negative of the Christian attitude towards death. It shows us the horrors that can be brought on by unbelief in the face of our inevitable mortality, so in a somewhat paradoxical way, the film points to the good news of the Gospel by highlighting the “bad news” of our hopeless fate without God.

Along with the great horror or the excellent characters, that deep resonance with our faith makes Bring Her Back one of the best movies of the year. It might even be better than the Philippous’ feature debut, but I need to let the film sink in a bit more before I can say that definitively. Either way, I think Bring Her Back is destined to become a genre classic, so if you enjoy this particular brand of terror, I highly recommend that you check it out. You won’t be disappointed.