WARNING: This article contains SPOILERS for Bring Her Back.
Filmmakers Danny and Michael Philipou have delivered a terrifying and powerful follow-up to their 2023 horror movie,Talk to Me, withBring Her Back. Also produced by A24, the new film follows two orphaned siblings who are put under the foster care of a woman practicing dark magic to revive her dead daughter.
Many comparisons can be drawn betweenTalk to Meand2025’sBring Her Back. They are both shocking and gruesome supernatural horror films that explore similar themes and feature concepts involving ghosts and spiritual possession, withTalk to Me’s embalmed hand allowing people to talk to ghosts and have their bodies possessed. Additionally, likeTalk to Me, Bring Her Backhas become Certified Fresh onRotten Tomatoes,earning a 90% rating from critics. While both films are exceptional and terrifying pictures by the Philippous,one is superior to the otherin terms of the scares, performances, themes, and originality.
Bring Her Back vs. Talk To Me: Which One Is Scarier?
Talk To Me Features More Varied And Intense Scares
Bring Her Backis a much slower-burning horror moviethanTalk to Me. The film evokes terror by creating an unsettling atmosphere and building tension through strange occurrences and gruesome imagery. However,many ofBring Her Back’s biggestscares hinge a lot on eerie VHS footage and the possessed Oliver, who steals the show with his creepy mannerisms, demonic transformations, and ravenous feeding on human flesh, including his own.
Talk to Mewastes no time getting to the very scary stuff, with the first scene showing a possessed teenager suddenly cutting his brother and stabbing himself in the head. At the same time, the film effectively builds intense terror and tension without relying on jump scares. However, whenTalk to Medoes release surprise scares, it takes the extreme approach to frighten viewers with its violent, gory, and unsettling visuals. The possessed Riley is a prime example of this, suddenly bashing his face, mutilating himself, and even reveling in the pain, making the film’s horror especially shocking and memorable.
Bring Her Back vs. Talk To Me: Which Better Explores Grief?
Bring Her Back Shows A More Developed Depiction Of Grief
Grief is a core theme in bothTalk to MeandBring Her Back, with each film showing how people can struggle to cope with loss, with some going to dangerous lengths to get rid of their pain.Talk to Meshows Mia allowing herself to get possessed by spirits for the thrill of it, just to numb the pain of her mother’s death. She eventually uses the embalmed hand to communicate with the supposed ghost of her mother, showing how grief and addiction intertwine. However, the film doesn’t show Mia trying to undo her mother’s death.
Meanwhile,Bring Her Backexplicitly shows Laura going through the stages of grief, specifically the bargaining stage. In Laura’s case, it’s Faustian bargaining, asshe uses a dark ritual to attempt to transfer her daughter’s spirit to Piper’s body after killing the latter, using the possessed “Oliver” as a demonic conduit. Unlike Mia, Laura explicitly accepts her daughter’s death at the end of the film, backing out of the ritual and refusing to kill Piper after seeing the harm she is doing.
Bring Her Back vs. Talk To Me: Which Has Better Performances?
Talk To Me Shows A Lot More Range With Its Cast
Actor Sally Hawkins carries a lot ofBring Her Backwith her well-rounded performance as Laura, who seamlessly shifts between being a loving, quirky, grieving, and conniving character throughout the film. Billy Barratt and Sora Wong also stand out for their layered and realistic performances as siblings Andy and Piper, and the young Jonah Wren Phillips delivers an extremely chilling performance as the silent but bloodthirsty Oliver, making for one of the most terrifying child characters in horror movie history.
Like Hawkins, Sophie Wilde holds upTalk to Meas the flawed but sympathetic protagonist, Mia, while portraying many other terrifying characters inhabiting her body.
Talk to Me’s cast, which mainly consists of young adults, shows a lot more diversityin their acting skills. Many of them portray different personas as their characters are possessed by spirits summoned by the embalmed hand. For instance, unlike the mostly silent and subdued Phillips, Joe Bird displays a lot more range asRiley inTalk to Mebefore and after the character is possessed, making his transformation especially terrifying. Like Hawkins, Sophie Wilde holds upTalk to Meas the flawed but sympathetic protagonist, Mia, while portraying many other terrifying characters inhabiting her body.
Bring Her Back vs. Talk To Me: Which Story Is More Original
Talk To Me Uses Possession To Tell A Clever, Unusual Tale With Relevant Themes
Talk to Meputs a new spin on horror classics likeThe Exorcistbyusing possession asa clever metaphor for addiction in the modern ageof smartphones, social media, and substance abuse. The fact that the characters willingly live-stream videos of themselves letting ghosts take over their bodies reflects how far young adults are willing to go to get high and garner digital likes. It also shows how such reckless behavior can have disastrous, life-threatening results, as some of the characters use the embalmed hand for too long, lose control of themselves, and end up hurting themselves and others.
On the other hand,the story ofBring Her Backdoesn’t add anything that freshto the horror genre, specifically the possession subgenre. The movie’s originality primarily stems from its execution, with the way bodily possession and the transfer of spirits work in the story making it distinctive enough. However, audiences have already seen shadowy cults and families putting spirits into people’s bodies in many other horror films, includingAri Aster and A24’sHereditary.
Talk To Me Is Better Than Bring Her Back
Talk To Me Outranks Bring Her Back With Its Scares, Cast, And Unique Story
In the end, the Philippous' first two horror movies are emotional, gut-wrenching pictures that are difficult to forget, butTalk to Mestands as the best of the two.Bring Her Backpresents a deeper, more well-rounded analysis of grief thanTalk to Methrough Laura’s character arc and Hawkins' compelling performance. Despite that,Talk to Metriumphs overBring Her Backby showing a greater versatilityin its cast and its scares, with the latter starting right from the film’s beginning and hitting audiences hard with several visceral scenes.
Bring Her Backmay have immediately become one ofA24’s best horror movies. Nevertheless, two years after its release,Talk to Meremains a distinctive kind of possession moviethat will more likely stand out in the years to come thanBring Her Backdue to the inventive use of its concept to reflect several relevant issues and unleash many surprising and memorable scares.
