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Review #286 of 365
Film: Deliver Us From Evil (2006) [NR] 101 minutes
WIP™ Scale: $13.00
Where Viewed: Landmark Chez Artiste, Denver, CO
Special Denver Film Society Advance Screening
When 1st Seen: 24 October 2006
Time: 7:30 p.m.
Film's Official Website
DVD Release Date: unscheduled
Directed by: Amy Berg
Written by: Amy Berg
Featured Cast:
Thomas Doyle and Oliver O'Grady
Click for 'Review Lite' [a 150-word or less review of this film]
A must see film, Amy Berg's first documentary explores, without the assistance of the Catholic Church itself, the enormous and controversial world of clergy-child sexual abuse in the United States. What sets her documentary above and beyond any previous investigations into the matter, and perhaps unlike any film on child molestation in history, is that she includes edited interviews of a candid former priest, Oliver O'Grady. The Irish priest has admitted to sexually abusing over one hundred children in California during the 70s and 80s before he was finally arrested, sentenced to 14 years in prison, released after 7 years, and deported to Ireland. In footage that will surely shock most any person, he is open and honest about what he did. He is unable to clearly explain why he did this. All he knows is that he did, and the urges to continue to abuse female and male children were simply too strong to resist.
The story of Oliver O'Grady beings quite innocently for the families that took him into their homes as a trusted vessel of God in their faith, allowed them as much access to their children as he desired, and even encouraged more interactions when they felt he would be able to guide their children down the righteous path, and lead them from temptations. His victims were generally around the age of 9 or younger when he started in with them. He describes his encounters as growing in their number and in the degree as he got older and the children got more 'accustomed' to him. None of the parents involved were able to save their children from being abused. It was only after, and only after he had been moved from parish to parish to parish by his senior priests, bishops, and cardinals, that people began to put things together, and the children, now older, were able to explain what happened to them. The documentary focuses on the impact O'Grady had in particular on three so-called 'survivors'—a term that is loaded but used for a back of a better one, and loaded because interviews with these three cause one to wonder if each actually has survived their encounters with O'Grady because none has a the life of his or her dreams. These three, two women and one young man, are given ample opportunity to describe what happened to them, the way it made them feel, why they said nothing to their parents or any other trusted member of their inner circle, and how they feel now as adults. It is powerful to see these three come to grips with their circumstances. It is also interesting to listen to their stories of why they kept quiet. One woman had concluded that she couldn't tell her parents because she felt father would kill O'Grady, and a schoolmate had told her that a man that kills another spends the rest of his life in prison. She did not want that to happen to her father, so she said nothing. In fact, her family was one of the first that took in O'Grady, exposed him to all of their children, and bailed him out of jail in disbelief of the charges the first time he was arrested for child sexual assault. Later, they would have to come to grips, as parents, with the fact that not only had they not protected their 9-year old daughter from repeated sexual encounters including rape, but they had not even noticed anything unusual.
The story of Oliver O'Grady beings quite innocently for the families that took him into their homes as a trusted vessel of God in their faith, allowed them as much access to their children as he desired, and even encouraged more interactions when they felt he would be able to guide their children down the righteous path, and lead them from temptations. His victims were generally around the age of 9 or younger when he started in with them. He describes his encounters as growing in their number and in the degree as he got older and the children got more 'accustomed' to him. None of the parents involved were able to save their children from being abused. It was only after, and only after he had been moved from parish to parish to parish by his senior priests, bishops, and cardinals, that people began to put things together, and the children, now older, were able to explain what happened to them. The documentary focuses on the impact O'Grady had in particular on three so-called 'survivors'—a term that is loaded but used for a back of a better one, and loaded because interviews with these three cause one to wonder if each actually has survived their encounters with O'Grady because none has a the life of his or her dreams. These three, two women and one young man, are given ample opportunity to describe what happened to them, the way it made them feel, why they said nothing to their parents or any other trusted member of their inner circle, and how they feel now as adults. It is powerful to see these three come to grips with their circumstances. It is also interesting to listen to their stories of why they kept quiet. One woman had concluded that she couldn't tell her parents because she felt father would kill O'Grady, and a schoolmate had told her that a man that kills another spends the rest of his life in prison. She did not want that to happen to her father, so she said nothing. In fact, her family was one of the first that took in O'Grady, exposed him to all of their children, and bailed him out of jail in disbelief of the charges the first time he was arrested for child sexual assault. Later, they would have to come to grips, as parents, with the fact that not only had they not protected their 9-year old daughter from repeated sexual encounters including rape, but they had not even noticed anything unusual.
"Shocking and poignant interviews, gripping music, and a candid approach, makes Deliver Us From Evil a stand out documentary."
While O'Grady is frank about his urges and acknowledges that he regrets what he did to the children, his pad answer to them after all this has been said and done is, "It just shouldn't have happened." He finds himself really unable to say he is sorry, at least never in an authentic way. He goes so far as to sit down in his home in Ireland and write each victim a letter inviting each to come to Ireland and allow him to apologize in person. He claims that he wants to help them be able to move on in their lives and that they would want him to be able to do the same. It doesn't cross his mind that they might never ever want to see him again unless it was on his day of execution.
Meanwhile, Ms Berg intersperses the footage of interviews with O'Grady, the survivors, and graphical maps showing O'Grady's path of abuse town by town throughout northern California with courtroom footage of bishops and cardinals being questioned about their knowledge of O'Grady and his history of abuse. Notably, eventual Cardinal of Los Angeles Roger Mahoney did everything he could to 'protect' children in one town after another by moving O'Grady from town to town. It seems he hoped that a new town would give him a fresh start. And it did, unfortunately, for the kids in each successive town. Also featured is the work of Father Thomas Doyle, a Catholic priest who has been working to get the Catholic Church to take responsibility not only for the past, but for ensuring this never happens again in the future. He goes so far as to assisting two survivors interviewed for the film in the writing of a letter for the Pope which they then try, unsuccessfully, to deliver. So, for the survivors, on the one hand they have their resentment and disgust for O'Grady, but worse, as adults they now hold resentment and loathing for the Catholic Church and it's power mavens for allowing O'Grady to go on for so decades. Unfortunately, the film reveals again in graphic ways that nearly every state in the union has been affected, and that the number of children caught in the web in the tens of thousands. According to the film over 80% of the victims/survivors never find themselves able to report the abuse so the full extent of the abuse, the real numbers, may never be known.
This is definitely a film for the survivors. Moreover, it is a film to help other survivors know they are not alone. The interviews with O'Grady serve to guide parents as to how to keep a watchful eye on their children and what to avoid. The film also reveals the extent to which, unfortunately, the Catholic Church has failed to make significant progress on the problem which the sociologist and psychologist interviewed seem to feel that the purported 10% of the clergy that are pedophiles may become so because their training traps them in a psychosexual developmental stage such that later when they have sexual urges they are toward younger people. As there is nothing Biblical in the celibacy requirements for Priests, rather only evolved doctrine that some believe stems from a time long ago when the Church did not want the property and wealth of priests to be inherited by wives and children, many feel this problem would not be so prevalent if priests were allowed to have partners and marry. While some will try to turn this into an hetero vs. homosexual issue, with some members of the Catholic Church even suggesting that if all of the gay priests were eliminated the problem would go away, the evidence refutes this as the vast majority of clergy sexual abuse is heterosexual and only a tiny percentage is homosexual or bi-sexual as was the case with O'Grady. In any case, while it is clear that the leadership of the Catholic Church does not come through looking very good in the film, there are signs of hope from Father Doyle who is working hard to help as many survivors find a way to move forward in their lives as he is able. Meanwhile, the film should help survivors know there is support out there for them. This is not a forgotten issue. Shocking and poignant interviews, gripping music, and a candid approach, make Deliver Us From Evil a stand out documentary.
Meanwhile, Ms Berg intersperses the footage of interviews with O'Grady, the survivors, and graphical maps showing O'Grady's path of abuse town by town throughout northern California with courtroom footage of bishops and cardinals being questioned about their knowledge of O'Grady and his history of abuse. Notably, eventual Cardinal of Los Angeles Roger Mahoney did everything he could to 'protect' children in one town after another by moving O'Grady from town to town. It seems he hoped that a new town would give him a fresh start. And it did, unfortunately, for the kids in each successive town. Also featured is the work of Father Thomas Doyle, a Catholic priest who has been working to get the Catholic Church to take responsibility not only for the past, but for ensuring this never happens again in the future. He goes so far as to assisting two survivors interviewed for the film in the writing of a letter for the Pope which they then try, unsuccessfully, to deliver. So, for the survivors, on the one hand they have their resentment and disgust for O'Grady, but worse, as adults they now hold resentment and loathing for the Catholic Church and it's power mavens for allowing O'Grady to go on for so decades. Unfortunately, the film reveals again in graphic ways that nearly every state in the union has been affected, and that the number of children caught in the web in the tens of thousands. According to the film over 80% of the victims/survivors never find themselves able to report the abuse so the full extent of the abuse, the real numbers, may never be known.
This is definitely a film for the survivors. Moreover, it is a film to help other survivors know they are not alone. The interviews with O'Grady serve to guide parents as to how to keep a watchful eye on their children and what to avoid. The film also reveals the extent to which, unfortunately, the Catholic Church has failed to make significant progress on the problem which the sociologist and psychologist interviewed seem to feel that the purported 10% of the clergy that are pedophiles may become so because their training traps them in a psychosexual developmental stage such that later when they have sexual urges they are toward younger people. As there is nothing Biblical in the celibacy requirements for Priests, rather only evolved doctrine that some believe stems from a time long ago when the Church did not want the property and wealth of priests to be inherited by wives and children, many feel this problem would not be so prevalent if priests were allowed to have partners and marry. While some will try to turn this into an hetero vs. homosexual issue, with some members of the Catholic Church even suggesting that if all of the gay priests were eliminated the problem would go away, the evidence refutes this as the vast majority of clergy sexual abuse is heterosexual and only a tiny percentage is homosexual or bi-sexual as was the case with O'Grady. In any case, while it is clear that the leadership of the Catholic Church does not come through looking very good in the film, there are signs of hope from Father Doyle who is working hard to help as many survivors find a way to move forward in their lives as he is able. Meanwhile, the film should help survivors know there is support out there for them. This is not a forgotten issue. Shocking and poignant interviews, gripping music, and a candid approach, make Deliver Us From Evil a stand out documentary.
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Deliver Us From Evil (2006) Review-lite [150-word cap]
A must see film, Amy Berg's first documentary explores, without the assistance of the Catholic Church itself, the enormous and controversial world of clergy-child sexual abuse in the United States. What sets her documentary above and beyond any previous investigations into the matter, and perhaps unlike any film on child molestation in history, is that she includes edits of interviews of a candid former abuser and priest, Oliver O'Grady. He has admitted to sexually abusing over one hundred children in California during the 70s and 80s before he was finally arrested, sentenced to 14 years in prison, released after 7 years, and deported to Ireland. The film makes the case that the leadership of the Catholic Church has not done enough for the survivors nor in attempting to stop the problem. Shocking and poignant interviews, gripping music, and a candid approach, make Deliver Us From Evil a stand out documentary.
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