The best horror films aren’t the remakes
of Japanese ghost stories, the torture porn franchises, or the ones in which someone
knows what you did last summer. They aren’t the ones in which scream queens are
stalked by zombies or masked psychos or homicidal dolls. They are the ones that
illuminate the human condition and the spiritual nature of evil. And the best one
of those I’ve seen in a long time – in fact, the best demonic possession movie
I’ve seen in the four decades since The
Exorcist – is Deliver Us from Evil,
now out on DVD.
From the writer/director of The Exorcism of Emily Rose, another
well-done possession flick, Deliver Us
from Evil is based on the real-life supernatural experiences of New York
police sergeant Ralph Sarchie, played by Eric Bana. Sarchie grew up Catholic
but abandoned religion at the age of twelve, so when he is confronted not only
by a freaky mystery man committing shocking crimes, but also by auditory
hallucinations linked to those crimes, he is in denial about the true nature of
the darkness that he’s facing – until he meets Father Mendoza, a drug
addict-turned priest, played by the criminally underappreciated actor Edgar
Ramirez.
Sarchie initially would have agreed
with Joseph Conrad, who wrote that “the belief in a supernatural source
of evil is not
necessary; men alone are quite capable of every wickedness.” There was a time
when Mendoza too didn’t believe in possession, until a personal experience
opened his eyes to the nature of, as he calls it, “primary evil.” Now he ministers
to the victims of demonic possession, and he and Sarchie end up working
together.
Sarchie uncovers increasingly
bizarre layers to the case, and baffling violence. “That’s the mystery of
primary evil,” Mendoza explains. “Its destructiveness makes no sense. Not to
us.”
While sharing drinks in a bar, the
skeptic cop challenges the priest about his faith: “You see, Father, as we
speak, every day out there, someone’s getting’ hurt, ripped off, murdered,
raped. Where’s God when all that’s happening?”
“In the hearts of people like you who
put a stop to it,” Mendoza replies evenly. “I mean, we can talk all night about
the problem of evil, but what about the problem of good?” If there is no God, he
says, if the world is just survival of the fittest, then why are men willing to
lay down their lives for total strangers?
Kudos to writer/director Scott
Derrickson for creating in Mendoza a priest who isn’t the usual one-dimensional
stereotype but a fully realized – and deeply human – character. Mendoza doesn’t
seem the saintly type, Sarchie observes, and Mendoza agrees. The priest has
struggled with the evil inside himself, and hasn’t always won. But, as he says,
“A saint is not a moral exemplar. A saint is a life-giver.” Mendoza confesses
to Sarchie a moral failure in his past, after which he had “committed to
walking the path of grace.”
Now, Mendoza tells him, it is Sarchie
who must confess the darkness in his own soul before he can successfully
grapple with the primary evil that they’re up against – otherwise the demon
will exploit it. It is a profound acknowledgement: that we are all flawed and
vulnerable to evil, and what empowers us to combat it is seeking God’s
forgiveness for our sinful debt.
SPOILER ALERT
As you might expect, the film
builds to a lengthy, intense exorcism scene. The demon targets and nearly
conquers the vulnerable Father Mendoza before finally being cast out of its
human host, played by Sean Harris, through the invocation of Jesus Christ.
Harris does an incredible job of conveying, in one stricken facial expression,
the horror of his character’s experience under possession, and his gratitude and
relief for being rescued from it. It’s a masterfully directed and emotionally
convincing climax.
Deliver
Us from Evil offers not only plenty of chills and action sequences, but
also the kind of human and spiritual insights that elevate this among the best
examples of its genre.
(This article originally appeared here on Acculturated, 11/21/14)
