Screamers, eerie sound effects, gory death scenes; these are just some of the things that you can expect from Scott Derrickson’s latest horror flick, “Deliver Us From Evil”.
“Deliver Us From Evil” is a thoroughly enjoyable film with fitting sound effects at just the right timing. The film has a gradual build-up of suspense as the story slowly unfolds all the mysterious unexplainable events. Directed by Scott Derrickson, the film has a few notable similarities to his own breakout film, “The Exorcism of Emily Rose” as it contains elements of demonic possession and exorcism. Yes, we bet you haven’t forgotten about Emily Rose yet!
But instead of telling the story of the possessed victims, “Deliver Us From Evil” focuses on the story of NYPD veteran Ralph Sarchie who experienced true paranormal events as written in his book, “Beware The Night”.
Having watched so many horror films, there is one common “horror film pattern” in this one; cops dismissing the paranormal cases until it happened to them. Ralph Sarchie (played by the “Hulk” star Eric Bana) is a cop who believed he has “outgrew” God and that all the evil purely comes from human nature. Unlike other cops in other horror films, Sarchie is not an average cop as he was known for his “radar”, which has helped him solved numerous cases.
Needless to say, the “radar” is deemed to be a curse because it has also pulled him into a string of unexplainable cases and inevitably darkened his soul, to the point of affecting his relationship with his wife, Jen (played by Olivia Munn) and their young daughter, Christina (played by Lulu Wilson).
Ralph Sarchie partnered up with his sidekick Butler (played by Joel Mchale), the “adrenaline junkie” cop who uses his knife as the weapon of choice to fight crime. It was rather odd and awkward to watch Joel Mchale starring in the horror film as he’s mostly known for his comedic character in “Community“. Perhaps Derrickson tried to lighten up the overall seriousness of the film with some funny elements, however, we found that some jokes were unnecessary if the film was aimed to create an overall good horror film experience.
From estranged domestic violence to psychotic woman who threw her baby into the lion’s den at the zoo, the paranormal cases in the film eventually led Sarchie to believe in the existence of demons especially after he met Joe Mendoza, a renegade priest (played by Édgar Ramírez). Together with Mendoza and Butler, Rachie and the team discovered more unconventional truths about the paranormal cases and the mysterious man (played by Sean Harris) who appeared in many of the crime scenes. The same mysterious man was believed to be the root of all evil.
In the beginning of the film, Jane Crenna (played by Olivia Horton) was persuaded to throw her baby into the lion’s den upon seeing the mysterious man in the zoo. Jane was later admitted into the mental hospital and from that moment onwards, the audience is treated to all sorts of clichés that you’d expect to see in films about demonic possession. The demonic possession and exorcism in “Deliver Us From Evil” also strikes a huge resemblance to Derrickson’s breakout film “Exorcism of Emily Rose”.
No prizes for guessing why.
Just like Derrickson’s previous horror film, “Sinister”, “Deliver Us From Evil” has recycled the idea of using kids’ laughter and creepy toys as the elements of jump scares. The director wasted no opportunities to transform the toys into a person’s worst nightmare. Especially that scene where Sarchie’s daughter got her hands on a new owl stuff toy to play with as well as some other eerie toys including her clown-themed music box (good use of clown there).
Overall, the film could have been done better if it doesn’t include all the horror film clichés. Almost everything becomes predictable as the story unfolds itself. However, we got to give a huge round of applause to Sean Harris for doing particularly well with portraying his character:
Ready to give yourself a good scare? “Deliver Us From Evil” is set to be released on 3rd July.
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