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Talk To Me directors Michael and Danny Philippou’s new movie, Bring Her Back, has launched a fully functioning black market site plucked from the film’s universe. But as much as it’s a genius marketing tool, its horrific content has me convinced that the Philippou brothers need to make a found footage horror movie next.
Blackangeltapes made its way online a week after Bring Her Back hit theaters in the US. It acts as a black market where users can sell ritualistic objects for sale, such as a Timmy Tiger Puppet used to locate dead bodies, and a chilling voodoo doll containing a trapped soul. The site also features an embalmed hand similar to the one from the 2023 movie Talk To Me, all but confirming the two films are linked. Each listing states that there are no returns or refunds, and if the order gets intercepted by law enforcement, buyers must lie and "say you don’t know what it is or where it’s from."
There is no doubt that the site is one of the best pieces of horror movie marketing I have seen. It puts Longlegs’ TheBirthdayMurders to shame. Not only does blackangeltapes create a wider world around Bring Her Back, it’s also making UK fans all the more excited for the film to release later this summer. But there has got to be more to it. That’s why I think the Philippou brothers should put it to use.
Move over V/H/S
There are 15 items and video tapes listed on the site in total, from spiritual objects to blood taken from very human serial killers – all with multiple pictures and descriptions attached, building an almost complete story around each listing. It is clear that so much effort has been put into the site; it would be a shame for such a great amount of lore to go to waste.
From this site alone, the Philippou brothers have the basic ingredients to make a fully fledged anthology movie, similar to the likes of Shudder’s V/H/S franchise. The filmmakers could create a Bring Her Back spin-off of sorts, made up of 20 or so minute-long short films based around listings, exploring how the tapes came to be, and what the objects were used for. The actual site deserves some screen time, too.
There are rules and regulations listed for site users, as well as many streams of comments, meaning it is used often. We do know this from Bring Her Back, but this only solidifies that there is something much larger at play.
A found footage horror dream
Aside from the objects, the scariest part of the site has to be the tapes. The clips range from footage shot at a haunted house where a family went missing to recorded confessions from serial killers. There is also a post containing multiple accounts of a ‘dark web death dealer’ killing people by injecting an elusive liquid into their necks. One thing is for sure: more of these tapes would make a killer found footage horror movie.
But the two most spine-chilling videos on the whole site have to be ‘Sleep Watching Demon Slowly Eats Girl’ and the ‘Tari Ressurection Tapes’. The girl eating demon clips show a demonic creature watching a girl sleep and then attempting to eat her, kind of like The Midnight Man does in Gerald’s Game. "It gets closer every night and then slowly begins to eat her bit by bit each night," reads the description. The Tari Resurrection Tapes are even worse and link directly to Bring Her Back. The clip shows a woman being hanged and then brought back as a demon, who then starts to fasten on the face of another.
The videos are akin to some of the best found footage horror movies released during the sub-genre’s heyday in the early ‘00s, such as The Poughkeepsie Tapes and Lake Mungo. It’s no secret that the found footage genre has faced a bit of a drought over the past few years, but the Philippou brothers could be its saviors. Some of blackangeltapes is much scarier than a lot of horror movies released over the past few years, after all.
Bring Her Back is out in theaters in the US now and will hit UK cinemas on August 1. For more, check out our list of the best horror movies, or keep up with upcoming horror movies heading your way.
