The ever-present rain is reminiscent of the vibe in Seven Edgar is from Venezuela and had heard of a Venezuelan Jesuit priest who was like Mendoza and had done drugs and drunk a lot. At first he passed respectfully, because he thought the character wasn’t rich enough, so he and I got together and after a few afternoons we came up with the back-story of Mendoza. The character of Father Mendoza is an amalgam of two characters who were Ralph’s mentors. So I went after him because the real-life Ralph Sarchie is larger-than-life.Įdgar Ramirez is a great counter-weight and plays a priest with a colourful background He’s amazing at the larger-than-life characters like Chopper, Nero in Star Trek and Hoot in Black Hawk Down. He’s an actor for whom there are certain characters he is great at playing. And he was our police advisor on set.īana can blow hot or cold but he nails it here The movie is inspired by his memoirs, which centred on 10 cases and we used some artistic license in the movie But we got down perfectly the character of Ralph – it’s him. I saw one with a guy whose forehead splits open. Since he he retired he has assisted on exorcisms.

He made over 300 arrests and was shot at.

Back then the Bronx was an incredibly dangerous place and he served in the notorious 46th precinct, so he was a hardcore cop. He worked in the Bronx from the late 80s until he retired in 2005. I did a re-write of the script for Deliver Us From Evil and we moved ahead on that.īased on Eric Bana’s performance, Sarchie must be an intense character After I made Sinister, Sony asked me what I wanted to do next. I went off to make that and they spent seven or eight years developing the script. We did some ride-alongs with him and saw some exorcism tapes and Ralph gave me a photocopy of a book, which I optioned and turned into The Exorcism Of Emily Rose. Jerry optioned Ralph Sarchie’s memoirs in 2003 and hired me to write the script for it. How did you get involved on Deliver Us From Evil? Just don’t expect him to reveal anything about Doctor Strange. Derrickson tells Jeremy Kay about hard-boiled cops, wild priests and heavy New York rain. The story about a tough Bronx detective who teams up with a priest to investigate possible demonic possession is inspired by Beware The Night, the memoirs that Sergeant Ralph Sarchie co-wrote with Lisa Collier Cool.

Ralph sarchie and father mendoza