Cop’s tale ‘delivers’
‘Evil’ star is rattled by exorcism
ACTOR ERIC BANA was scared out of his wits before cameras even started filming his latest movie, “Deliver Us From Evil.”
While researching his role as real life former NYPD officer-turned-paranormal investigator Ralph Sarchie in the movie opening Friday, Bana watched grainy tape that’s supposed to be a genuine exorcism. The footage still haunts the Australian actor.
“It was quite confronting. If I could have avoided it, I probably would have, but I saw it and it will be forever etched into my brain,” Bana said.
And that’s all he’ll say on the matter.
Director Scott Derrickson is more comfortable talking about the tape that Bana still can’t shake.
“That videotape in particular is pretty harrowing. You see a guy’s forehead split open and nobody’s touching him,” says Derrickson. “He does not look like a human being … when we left (the viewing room) I remember Eric being literally pale, going ‘That was one too many exorcism videos for me.’”
Derrickson has been immersed in the subject of paranormal activity since he wrote the first draft for “Deliver Us From Evil” about 11 years ago. It’s based on Sarchie’s 2001 memoir, “Beware the Night.”
The Queens-born Sarchie, 52, retired from the NYPD in 2004, after spending much of his 20-year career patrolling the streets of Bronx’s 46th Precinct. But even as he was battling evil of the more conventional kind, the lifelong Catholic felt the pull of a higher calling.
“I always felt that God was real, and I always felt the devil was real,” Sarchie told his hometown paper. “So there really wasn’t a stretch for me. All I really needed to do was to have faith and to get the knowledge that I needed to battle the devil.”
So he sought out the famed husband and wife paranormal investigator Ed and Lorraine Warren — themselves the subjects of last year’s “The Conjuring” — and picked up a moonlighting gig assisting on exorcisms.
When he wrote his book, he was ambitious enough to get a copy in the hands of producer Jerry Bruckheimer. And though “Deliver Us From Evil” languished for years in development hell, the filmmakers never lost faith.
Cameras finally started rolling on “Deliver Us From Evil” with Sarchie on set consulting as an expert on police procedures. The production filmed on location in the Bronx — just in time for one of the hottest summers in New York City history.
“It’s a horror movie, so it was mostly night shoots,” says Bana. “We’d sleep through the hottest parts during the day. But the Bronx being a true character in the film, it couldn’t have been shot anywhere else.”
Thou gh the film is a mostly fictional account that only incorporates bits and pieces from Sarchie’s cases, a creepy vibe pervaded the set. Derrickson, who recently was tapped to direct Marvel Studios’ “Dr. Strange,” got scared by actor Sean Harris’ method acting as a possessed Iraq War vet in the film’s climactic exor
cism scene.
“Sean went into this trance state, literally,” says Derrickson. “He was as much in this weird, dark mental state … and he was physically retching in between takes, which was kind of freaking the other actors out.”
As scary as exorcisms can be, that’s nothing compared to the dread Sarchie feels with all this media attention.
“I feel like I’m naked in the middle of Yankee Stadium in the middle of the World Series,” Sarchie says. “It’s pretty frightening.”