Deliver Us (2023) - Horror Film Review

I rarely take time off from writing this blog, but a spur of the moment decision a week or so back saw me deciding that once a year on my birthday week I would do just that. This has led to all my scheduled posts being delayed by a week, but I think it has also helped me return to blogging more focussed.
Deliver Us is a religious horror co-directed by Cru Ennis and Lee Roy Kunz (the later also starring in the film and co-writing this with Kane Kunz) dealing with the antichrist. While I'm not a religious person, I do enjoy a good demonic possession film, and religious horror is a cousin of that genre.

Father Daniel Fox (Lee Roy Kunz) is a priest looking to leave the Catholic church in order to start a family with his pregnant girlfriend. Having had a history of helping those who believe themselves to be possessed, he is asked to take on one last job. In a Russian convent there is signs that one of the sisters there, Sister Yulia (Maria Vera Ratti) is experiencing religious miracles, having gotten pregnant with twins in an apparent immaculate conception. Daniel assumes this to be something that can rationally be explained, but the convent leader, Cardinal Russo (Alexander Siddig - Game of Thrones, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine TV shows) believes it relates to an ancient prophecy older than the bible itself. The prophecy states that twins will be born, one an instrument for good and one an instrument for evil. This is something that Father Saul (Thomas Kretschmann - Avengers: Age of Ultron, Resident Evil: Apocalypse) also believes, but his intentions are not noble, secretly worshipping the devil.
With Saul's intentions laid bare, Daniel, Russo and Yulia flee the convent, with the woman later giving birth on a train. They head to a remote house in Estonian woodland hoping to raise the children in peace, but Saul is hot on their heels, determined to kill the 'good' twin and usher in a time of darkness.

Of course, the most well known antichrist film is The Omen, and this shares some similarities with that one. The difference here is that it is known that the antichrist is there in person. There is some justification for keeping it alive with Yulia believing that it can be taught to see the world as good, as well as not wanting to see either of her children dead. To be fair, it would probably be better off dead as it has a habit of being able to psychically link with people in order to try to get them to murder its brother! There was a slight slow pace to the film, with much of the first two acts consisting of the babies giving Yulia and Daniel shared dreams/visions, while Saul has his own subplot of mercilessly seeking out their location.

Of course, their paths eventually do cross, and while I thought Kretschmann was decent in his role, this antagonistic character didn't really have too much to him, his every action is evil, with him happy to kill anyone even remotely in his way. It does lead to a great payoff, with some scenes in the movie being quite gory. From someone being mauled to death by wolves, to a crucifix in the eye, a poker through a face and people's throats being slit, this violence looked great on screen. I especially liked the opening scene of a row of victims being killed one by one, the blood from each kill splashing onto the next person.

Deliver Us has quite a saturated look, with an absence of much colour to be found in the washed out imagery. For a dark and despondent feel this worked well, as did the choice of locations. Whenever protagonist rock up to an apparent place of safety that itself looks like the setting for a horror film, you know that things are going to remain bleak. I loved the remote house due to the bizarre paintings left there by the previous owner that seem to relate to what is happening in the present. I also thought this taking place against a backdrop of a world falling into ruin was neat, Daniel's girlfriend might not have really done much, but she gave a look into the goings on of the outside world. This does lead to one of the more silly looking scenes. There was supposed to be a big brawl happening in one scene, but if you pay attention to the background characters, they are blatantly pulling their punches, making for unwelcome distraction from the part of this scene that is meant to be the focus!

I enjoyed Deliver Us, it worked well as a religious horror. With a somewhat slow middle, and characters who weren't the most engaging this wasn't all perfect, but the special effects and choice of locations were all fantastic. Deliver Us had its UK and Irish release on 19th February on digital platforms including Google, Apple TV, Sky and Amazon.

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