Deliver Us From Evil (Blu-ray / DVD)
Ted Hentschke
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Starring Eric Bana, Edgar Ramirez, Olivia Munn, Sean Harris, Joel McHale
Directed by Scott Derrickson
Distributed by Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
Like a narcoleptic DJ, Deliver Us from Evil is inconsistent. It feels like a man with tourettes is trying to narrate The Silence of the Lambs, so every once in a while during the tense or charactery bits, he just jumps up and screams “OOGAH BOOGAH.” One of the dumbest “thinking man’s” movies around, it still held the distinction of being one of my favorite summertime releases. The characterization is done uncharacteristically well for a horror-genre popcorn-film, and the antagonist is genuinely unsettling.
In case you are not familiar, Deliver Us from Evil is a supernatural thriller about a New York Bronx cop played by Joel McHale tragically dying an hour and a half in, leaving all the dramatic weight on Eric Bana’s shoulders. Bana plays real life Bronx cop turned demonologist Ralph Sarchie, his characterization as a violent man coming to terms with his past to better confront evil holds up pretty well. Bana’s mannerisms and accent are pure New York Bronx, and it’s apparent that a lot of care went into making this movie look and feel very Bronx on top of feeling very supernatural. It is hard to imagine this film taking place anywhere else, so kudos to them for integrating the setting so well into the film.
The plot requires some leaps of faith that aren’t satisfyingly explained, so let me just recap the plot and just take at face value that I’m not pointing out the stupidity for the same reason you don’t have to point out when an elephant has decided to sit down in your living room. While investigating crimes out of the 46th precinct of the Bronx, Sergeant Ralph Sarchie hears a domestic disturbance call that sets off his “radar.” Explained as his sixth sense for weird and violent stuff, they find that the domestic dispute is both violent and weird. Hints of possession are there for those looking for it in the audience, but there are no spinning heads or inverted crosses, so it does a good job of slowly easing the characters into the world of the supernatural. Next, they get a call about a disturbance at the Bronx zoo, and during a nighttime manhunt encounter the antagonist, later revealed to be an Iraqi war vet named Santino, painting over some writing on a wall. From here the manhunt for Santino begins, with the first big break coming from an unrelated case, where a haunted house was found to be painted by Santino and the man from the first domestic dispute. How Sarchie manages to string together a series of seemingly unrelated cases into a single thread of logic is beyond reason, but you just kind of have to accept it like you accept that the elephant is going to eat all of your fruitcake.
Side-plots include Sarchie’s family somehow slowly becoming haunted by demons as well, and the dark history of Mendoza, the priest that brings Sarchie into the whole supernatural business. Over the course of the movie, Sarchie becomes more disturbed and agitated by the stuff he is seeing, and character arcs his way from skepticism all the way to becoming an exorcist himself. If it sounds like I’m not explaining something, its because a lot of the plot doesn’t really go anywhere. While things certainly happen in the movie, it is never really clear what the greater threat or endgame is. For example, the demons are given this sense of devious intent by painting over all of the demonic scratchings they leave on the walls. However, of the three demons, one ends its plotline by throwing itself off a building for the sole purpose of startling Sarchie, and the other just turns itself in to be exorcised. Not exactly masters of evil level planning there, demon hordes.
If it sounds like I am being harsh on Deliver Us from Evil, know that everything I didn’t like only stuck out because it was sandwiched in something I did like very much. Joel McHale’s performance is fantastic, but they have to cock it up by only letting him be in like 10% of the movie. There is a great scene where they watch security footage of Santino suspiciously talking to a lion, and then a bloody face just jumps on screen for a few seconds. It is one of a few asinine jump scares in the movie, and they fit in like the dicks from Fight Club, not really shocking you or adding anything. They just make you scratch your head and wonder “did they just stick their dicks in my supernatural thriller?”
Anyways, if I keep pointing at the elephants they will start feeling self-conscious. The shot design and sound design are great, and there are a lot of little flairs that add to the movie. Sarchie’s descent into anger and eventual redemption at the hands of God through confessing to Mendoza are done with adequate weight to be believable. The family drama and dark histories add a human weight to the characters, and are integrated well into the main plot. The acting is good all around, and the antagonist does a good job at being genuinely terrifying. Theres some good philosophical debate, that allows the movie to be watched intelligently if you ignore all the jump scares. Overall, the movie is enjoyable, but is dragged down by some questionable additions. It’s like someone on the staff was afraid that if something didn’t make me jump every 5 minutes, I’d fall asleep.
Oh, and Sarchie is also being haunted by The Doors. Yes, the band. But at this point you might as well just let the elephants have their own little tea party and enjoy the ride.
There are two sets of special features, one for general DVD release and one for Blu-Ray exclusively. In the general category, we have a Director’s Commentary track and a featurette on the making of the movie titled “Illuminating Evil: Making Deliver Us from Evil.” Clocking in at about 13 minutes, “Illuminating Evil” plays like an abridged version of all the other special features. You will get the key points from most of the Blu-Ray content, and whatever the marketing department decided was key from Derrickson’s commentary. It plays like a big pat on the back, but you get some sense of what they were trying to do.
The director’s commentary is unintentionally hilarious. I was first exposed to Derrickson’s work from his foray into the Hellraiser series. The fifth installment of the now totally shit series, I watched Hellraiser: Inferno as part of a marathon of the whole series with my girlfriend of the time. After Hellraiser 3: Shit Goes Bananas and Hellraiser 4: Hellraiser in Space, my girlfriend and I were weirded out that the fifth installment was actually not total shit. Along with Saw VI, it stands as an actually kind of good later installment to a series that has long lost any license to be anything but cash-grab screen-vomit. I liked Derrickson’s work on Sinister and The Exorcism of Emily Rose, but by God if it wasn’t proving that there could be a decent Hellraiser sequel that made me respect the man.
Which is why the commentary being such a rambling mess is hilarious. It would be just sad if he went up and talked about his kids the whole time, but Derrickson gives just enough little short bursts of insight that his 10 minute rants about how science is wrong because spirits exist, followed by a subsequent 5 minutes of hard backpedaling, come off as tremendously out of place. He seriously goes from talking about the interesting uphill battle he fought to get Joel McHale cast in the part he wrote for him, to telling anecdotes about McHale’s struggling theater career and slightly psychotic knife collection. If this commentary were done in more than one take and in any setting other than Derrickson sitting alone with a voice recorder and bottle of Gin, taking a shot every time he had to change the subject, I will eat my own foot.
As for the 3 Blu-Ray exclusive featurettes, they all focus on a specific aspect of the movie and are worth watching. “Deliver Us From Demons” is about the makeup and characterization of Santino, and it is genuinely cool to see him go from normal guy to total batshit demon. Nothing truly revelatory, but worth a watch. “The Two Sergeants” is about Bana learning from the real life Ralph Sarchie how to play Ralph Sarchie, and if anything gives you some respect for Bana’s commitment and process. It was cool to see how much of the real life person went into the performance of the sensationalized fictional character. It is worth a watch, especially for people familiar with Sarchie’s work.
The last feature, “The Demon Detective,” is easily the most interesting special feature. A small biopic on Sarchie, it gives the real life Ralph Sarchie a chance to color himself. A normal, hardworking, American guy, Sarchie comes off in that likeable and respectable way that most honorable working class people do. You get a real sense of pride in what he is saying, and most importantly never get a shred of him being disingenuous. He really believes in what he is doing, and regardless of if you believe in God and the Devil or exorcisms, his earnest candor is enough to make you understand where he is coming from. He’s no movie star, and certainly gets more comfortable as the interview goes on, but is the kind of no-nonsense guy that can cut through the glamour of being on screen and just tell his story. It is a genuinely enjoyable bit, even with all the God stuff.
Overall, the special features are worth a watch, as they do give you insight into how they shot the movie and what they were going for that was not already apparent. A bit of a back patting session for sure, but not enough to get in the way. If you can spring for the Blu-ray, do so, as the extra features bring in enough detail to be worth watching.
Special Features:
- Director’s Commentary
- Illuminating Evil” Making Deliver Us from Evil
- Deliver Us from Demons (Blu-ray Exclusive)
- The Two Sergeants (Blu-ray Exclusive)
- The Demon Detective (Blu-ray Exclusive)
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Film
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Special Features
Categorized:Reviews
