Film Review: 'Deliver Us From Evil' and yawns

Deliver Us From Evil
Director: Scott Derrickson
Cast: Eric Bana, Joel McHale, Edgar Ramirez, Olivia Munn
Rating: ** 

What's it about: Ralph Sarchie (Bana), a Special Ops cop in the New York Police Department, hears voices and radio static while on the job. He gets drawn to cases not originally assigned to him and partner Butler (McHale) prefers to call it Sarchie's 'radar'. Butler is an adrenaline junkie convinced that his partner is usually right about his hunches. But in the span of a week, they have close encounters of the demonic kind. Which could end badly for either or both. Meanwhile, an unbelieving Sarchie finds an unlikely ally in an undercover Catholic priest Mendoza (Ramirez), who offers to help. 

What's hot: We're seeing Bana almost a year after his last, Lone Survivor. The actor's instense performance somewhat lifts the drab film as does his banter with McHale and Ramirez, in what are probably the only silver linings in this film's dark skies.

What's not: For someone who tries to resuscitate dead babies, escapes a lion attack, gets a tonne of germs from being too close to a decomposing murder victim, gets routinely bitten by possessed people and doesn't believe in God, Sarchie might as well be Superman. It seems to kind of undo that whole suspension-of-disbelief illusion. There's only so much you're going to be ready to believe. And while this film has only a couple of genuine scares, it's nothing that has you reaching for someone's arm (or the chair's). The exorcisms seem too easy and not too believable. The film resorts to way too many horror film cliches. Why are investigations always  done at night? Despite scares, why are kids still kept in dark rooms and by themselves? Why do cops in such films never have backup? And why are ghosts, ghouls and demons getting increasingly immune to exorcisms? Somehow, we don't buy the lack-of-faith argument. There has got to be more.

What to do: Never truly rising from cliche and the expected tropes, Deliver..., supposedly based on a true story, is a cautionary tale (about how not to ruin a good horror film). All we can say is, deliver us from yawns.