Scott Derrickson may be known as a horror director but his scary sensibilities are tempered by a heavy dose of another genre – the police procedural. The Exorcism of Emily Rose was a clash between the Church and the boys in blue, while Sinister saw Ethan Hawke’s true crime author turning gumshoe to investigate the history of his haunted house. Deliver Us From Evil builds on this tendency, falling fully into the realm of moody police procedural with a hint of horror on the side.
In a very overcast New York City, hardworking cop Sarchie (Eric Bana) and his wise-cracking partner Butler (Joel McHale) get caught up in a series of disturbing crimes perpetrated by people who appear to be criminally insane. Swarthy, hard-drinking and utterly implausible man of the cloth Father Mendoza (Edgar Ramirez) disagrees, believing these crimes to be motivated by demonic forces. Sarchie is initially sceptical but soon joins forces with Mendoza to track down a shadowy war veteran (Sean Harris) who seems to be linked to these crimes.
The evil spirits that loom largest over this film are Derrickson’s delusions of grandeur. Like a bubblegum pop star trying to be taken seriously as a “real artist”, Derrickson seems to be attempting a seamless move between silly scares and The French Connection. Unfortunately, by trying to walk the precarious line between worthy police drama and pitch black horror, he manages to fail on both counts. The dramatic elements of the film feel inauthentic, from the overblown Noo Yawk accents adopted by Bana and on screen wife Olivia Munn, to the many cop cliches that are offered up as characterisation.
The horror aspects are similarly second-hand; an inevitability perhaps at this stage of horror history when dealing with demons and exorcists. Consequently, Deliver Us From Evil is incredibly dull. The most frustrating thing about all this is that Derrickson’s work in the horror genre up to this point has been ruthlessly efficient – suddenly there is a bagginess to his work that dampens its potential. The result of this genre experimentation is terrifying only in its tedium.