Summary
- Deliver Us From Evil is a horror film directed by Scott Derrickson, featuring real-life characters involved in demonic encounters.
- The cast of the film includes Eric Bana, Edgar Ramirez, Olivia Munn, and Joel McHale, who have all continued to have successful careers.
- While the movie had mixed reviews, the performances of the cast have stood the test of time, and the film remains a box-office success.
Deliver Us From Evil found Sinister and The Black Phone director Scott Derrickson revisiting the horror genre, supported by a talented cast playing real-life characters. Years after the success of his first theatrical feature The Exorcism of Emily Rose, Derrickson chose to revisit the exorcism subgenre with another fact-based story. This time, the focus lay on Ralph Sarchie, a former NYPD Sergeant who questioned his own faith after apparently witnessing demonic occurrences all across the city. Dedicating his life to traditionalist Catholic demonology later, Deliver Us From Evil covers this transition in Sarchie's life. However, Derrickson mostly relied on fictionalized details while borrowing inspiration from Sarchie's demonic encounters.
Having already worked with Hollywood veterans like Laura Linney and Ethan Hawke, the horror auteur resorted to an A-lister like Eric Bana to lead Deliver Us From Evil. The supporting cast is equally impressive boasting actors like Édgar Ramírez who would earn future fame with many releases after this 2014 release and Joel McHale who was already popular back then for starring in the sitcom Community. The movie was a box-office success but didn't fare well with critics. While Deliver Us From Evil might not be the freshest take on exorcisms and demonology, its cast has only aged well with time.
Eric Bana As Ralph Sarchie
Ralph Sarchie is introduced as a cynical NYPD Special Operations Sergeant who begins to question his own Catholic beliefs when he encounters multiple incidents of demonic possession. Eric Bana leads the Deliver Us From Evil cast as Sarchie, not the first real-life figure he's portrayed as he previously earned acclaim for playing notorious Australian criminal Mark "Chopper" Read in Chopper. The Australian actor's more mainstream appearances include the titular superhero in Hulk, Mossad agent Avner Kaufman in Munich and the Trojan prince Hector in Troy. Sci-fi fans will also remember him for playing the antagonistic Romulan captain Nero in JJ Abrams' Star Trek reboot.
Édgar Ramírez As Mendoza
Mendoza is the voice of faith in Deliver Us From Evil, a Jesuit priest from Spain who assists Ralph Sarchie in his quest to fight Satanic forces. Venezuelan actor Édgar Ramírez portrayed the character at a time when he was still relatively unknown. After supporting roles like playing CIA assassin Paz in The Bourne Ultimatum, he began getting meatier parts like real-life boxer Roberto Durán in Hands of Stone and CIA operative Larry Handley in Zero Dark Thirty. Ramírez also played the titular fashion designer in American Crime Story: The Assassination of Gianni Versace, a role for which he earned Emmy and Golden Globe nominations for Best Supporting Actor.
Olivia Munn As Jen Sarchie
Jen Sarchie is Ralph's wife who also gets personally involved in one of the exorcisms that her husband gets involved in. The Deliver Us From Evil character is played by TV host-turned-actress Olivia Munn. Before the 2014 horror, Munn appeared in Iron Man 2 as news reporter Chess Roberts and the titular hero's lover Joanna in Magic Mike. She further showcased her dramatic prowess on TV with a three-season-long run on The Newsroom as the socially inept economics professor Sloan Sabbith. X-Men fans can also spot her in X-Men Apocalypse as the telekinesis-powered mutant Psylocke. Her other genre projects include The Predator in which she played evolutionary biologist Casey Brackett.
Sean Harris As Mick Santino
Mick Santino aka Jungler is a former marine who is traumatized by not just his years of fighting but also the demons plaguing his mind. As a possessed individual, he even ends up targeting Ralph Sarchie and his loved ones. The morally-burdened character is portrayed by Sean Harris. Harris has walked into morally gray territory elsewhere too as he played Solomon Lane, the rogue MI6 agent and villain in Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation (a role he reprised in Mission: Impossible - Fallout), the mentally unstable geologist Fifield in Prometheus, and suspected child abductor Henry Teague in The Stranger.
Joel McHale As Butler
Ralph Sarchie’s fellow cop Butler is a veteran of the force much like Ralph himself. But as compared to the protagonist, Butler can be quite egoistic at times. Playing such self-obsessed characters isn’t new to actor Joel McHale considering how the Deliver Us From Evil cast member played the disgraced egotistical lawyer Jeff Winger in Dan Harmon’s genre-bending sitcom Community. McHale also has been regular to the superhero genre, having a brief role as a bank teller in Spider-Man 2 and the DC superhero Starman in the show Stargirl. The comedian occasionally serves as a TV host, mostly known for hosting the pop culture show The Soup.
Chris Coy As Jimmy Tratner
Jimmy Tratner is a former Marine whose wife is the first victim of the demonic possessions. While he helplessly tries to tend to his heavily injured and unstable wife, the cops mistake him for being responsible for her state. But as the plot reveals, Tratner has some secrets of his own. The character is played by Chris Coy who is best known for TV roles like the race supremacist Calvin Bunker in Banshee, the season 5 antagonist Martin in The Walking Dead, experienced bartender Paul Hendrickson in The Deuce and investigative reporter L.P. Everett in Treme, and Dallas vampire hotel bellboy Barry Horowitz in True Blood.
Dorian Missick As Gordon
Gordon is one of Ralph Sarchie’s partners in the NYPD, committed to the task of warding off demons from New York City. The character is portrayed by Dorian Missick, perhaps best known for his role as the voice of ex-soldier Victor Vance in Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories. Missick has also dabbled in television, playing the gambling-addicted limousine driver Damian Henry in Six Degrees, Detective Dunst in Better Call Saul and petty criminal Cockroach Hamilton in Luke Cage. He starred in the romantic drama Premium in which he played Reginald “Cool” Coolidge, a gas station worker who encounters his ex-fiancee (played by Zoe Saldana).
Deliver Us From Evil Supporting Cast & Characters
Lulu Wilson as Christina Sarchie - Ralph’s daughter Christina is played by Lulu Wilson, an actress who has appeared in many horror movies from a young age. As a child actress, she appeared in Ouija: Origin of Evil, Anabelle: Creation and the Netflix series The Haunting of Hill House. She also played a teenage version of Gloria Steinem in The Glorias.
Scott Johnsen as Lt. Griggs - Ralph’s superior at work is played by Scott Johnsen who played multiple law-enforcers in different episodes of Law & Order. He also appeared in the Tom Hardy-led thriller The Drop and the Nicole Kidman-led drama Birth.
Olivia Horton as Jane Crenna - Jane Crenna is a woman who is troubled to a traumatic level by demonic forces. She is played by Olivia Horton who appeared in the crime comedy The Dream Team and an episode of Law and Order: Special Victims Unit.
Rhona Fox As Zookeeper - Rhona Fox joins the Deliver Us From Evil cast as a zookeeper in the Bronx Zoo, the same place where a possessed Jane throws an infant toward a lion enclosure.
