Ralph Sarchie, played by Eric Bana, will satisfy the orthodox Catholic viewer. We agree with this film’s worldview, which is a nice thing. God is God in this film, and evil does not prevail, so the broad strokes are all in place. It was spooky and startling the way you want a scary movie to spook and startle you, but I was never terrified.

That said, my American film-going palette found this movie watchable. Yes, demons are real, and they are terrifying, but this film often takes something real and terrifying and paints it using shades of Hollywood’s lamest tropes. Then, the same victim, whose possessing demon is attempting to start an epidemic of possessions, slaughters a supporting character after said dagger-duel. But Deliver Us from Evil portrays them as all three, and throws in a dueling-daggers knife fight between cop and possessed perp that is straight out of Blade (for the uninitiated, a fantastical vampire franchise). But the problem is that by combining these possession and exorcism elements with “the fight scene” and “the high-stakes finale,” Derrickson has accidentally made light of something that is no laughing matter: the reality of demons.Įxorcisms are not quick, they are rarely gory, and they’re never The Thing You Need To Quickly Finish So You Can Save A Character’s Life. And it’s an exciting challenge for a filmmaker: blend genres in a way that hasn’t yet been attempted. It’s a clever idea, especially from a studio/marketing point of view: satisfy several audiences opening weekend. Here, Derrickson attempts to take the exorcism genre of horror film and blend it with the slasher flick and the cop thriller, building the story around the exploits of real-life NYPD Sgt. Its director and co-writer, Scott Derrickson, is a man of deep Christian faith, interested in telling stories in the vein of Flannery O’Connor and intent on using the grotesque to scare modern man out of his spiritual malaise. Deliver Us from Evil is a well-made and well-intentioned misfire.

Father mendoza and ralph sarchie