Content Warning: Physical abuse against a child
Spoiler Warning: The following review includes some spoilers for the film
Australian supernatural horror film Bring Her Back depicts the vulnerabilities of being a disabled child while simultaneously incorporating a fully fleshed-out portrayal of disability.
The film’s two main protagonists are Andy, a 17-year-old boy, and Piper, his younger stepsister who has low vision. After the sudden death of their father, the pair is placed into foster care with Laura, a seemingly caring woman whose late daughter was blind.
One of the things the film highlights is the flaws within the foster care system for children, and specifically for disabled children. Due to his age, Andy isn’t legally allowed to care for Piper, even though he has been looking after her for years. While the foster care system initially threatens to split them up, after some convincing, they’re able to remain together in a placement with Laura.
Laura’s initially sweet demeanor is revealed to be a ruse. She abuses Andy, continuously pouring her urine on him as he sleeps to make him think he’s wet himself, and coaxing him into admitting some resentment of Piper, among other misdeeds. Armed with this fabricated instability and his admission of frustration, Laura physically abuses Piper and frames Andy for it to sow doubt within Piper, cause a rift between the pair, and to depict Andy as violent to get him out of the picture. Though the film has a supernatural bent (including Laura’s reasons for her actions), it nonetheless reflects the reality of abuse that adults can inflict on children within the foster care system.
Laura is able to carry out this abuse for so long due to her outsized power in the situation. When Andy tries to reveal her abuse, he’s initially met with skepticism. Part of the doubt is rooted in his lower credibility as a teenager. Part of it is due to her prior characterization of Andy as unreliable. And it’s also partly rooted in the way Laura is able to leverage her knowledge of, and status within, the foster care system. Laura is a former counselor, having worked in the system for more than 20 years. This insider knowledge grants her a precise understanding of exactly what she needs to do in order to depict Andy as violent, unstable, and untrustworthy in her attempts to separate him from Piper. Additionally, her reputation as a good and effective counselor, specifically with the kids’ caseworker, further bolsters her credibility.
The film does an excellent job of depicting the experiences of a disabled child through Piper, highlighting both its normalcy alongside vulnerability. Throughout the film, she is depicted as a fully autonomous person, a girl who likes to dance around and have fun, and who frequently quarrels with her brother. She’s often shown making her own decisions and having those decisions respected by others.
Nonetheless, her disability leaves her susceptible to manipulation. Due to her low vision, Piper must rely on her other senses and what other people tell her to know what’s going on. In a particularly harrowing scene, Laura, to cement Andy as violent, sprays his deodorant on herself, sneaks into Piper’s room while she’s sleeping, and then slams her fist down hard on Piper’s face, before quickly running away. Piper bolts upright, screaming out in pain, while Andy sleeps unknowingly in another room. The next day, he wakes up to see her bruised face. After asking what happened, with Piper responding that someone hit her, Laura launches into accusations against Andy, even claiming that he’d done it and forgotten. When he again asks who hit her, Piper replies that she doesn’t know, but that they smelled like him. The filmmakers pepper this incongruity throughout; what Piper knows is often a different and obscured version of reality from what the audience and Andy know. This discrepancy not only ramps up the tension and suspense but also authentically depicts the type of vulnerabilities individuals with low vision face.
The film spotlights the kind of nuanced relationship that can develop between siblings where one is disabled and the other is not. Oftentimes, families of disabled individuals are depicted very two-dimensionally. Instead, Andy and Piper have a more grounded sibling dynamic. They’re at times affectionate and at times squabble; they joke around and tease each other; they offer care and support. All the while, Andy maintains his concern and protectiveness over Piper. Later on, through conversation with Laura, Andy reveals that he holds some resentment against Piper. When their parents married, Andy’s dad unambiguously favored Piper, and after acting out in attempts to receive attention, he was beaten by their father. This portrayal of animosity alongside love makes for an authentic picture of the sort of relationships that some disabled people have with their families.
Disability is oftentimes vilified on screen, depicted as worthy of disgust and derision. Many horror antagonists are themselves disabled. In and of itself, the existence of disabled villains isn’t inherently a problem. However, the overrepresentation (compared to disabled protagonists or even just side characters) in this role has established an outsized connection between disability and insidiousness on screen, which only further enshrines the discomfort that people already feel towards disability in real life.
Bring Her Back bucks this trend by showcasing a disabled character who is the subject (rather than the perpetrator) of horror. By depicting a fully developed disabled character, with a distinct personality, full autonomy, and complex relationships, Piper is a compelling character who is part of a compelling story, rather than merely being a two-dimensional victim of the situation.
While the film’s visceral bodily gore and psychological horror mean that it certainly won’t be for everyone, its depiction of disability is refreshing to see on screen.
