NETFLIX fans have been left haunted by the streaming services’ new scary movie The Deliverance.
Director Lee Daniels discussed a series of bizarre incidents, which included the death of his dog and cast member Mo’Nique‘s hospitalization, in an interview with SiriusXM’s Bevy Smith.
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Netflix posted a clip from the film, which showed Mo’Nique standing in a hospital room with a small boy in four-point restraints.
He gives her a look before busting out of the restraints, landing in an odd way on the floor.
Suddenly, he crawls backward up the wall, maintaining eye contact with Mo’Nique all the while.
In the comments, fans expressed their fright.
Some posted videos and GIFs of Mo’Nique, including one clip of her saying “Can y’all believe this s**t?” and a GIF of her shaking her head no.
“Surprised he ain’t do this,” one person posted, adding a GIF of Spider-Man.
“OMG,” a second person posted.
“Woww,” a third wrote.
“Oh oh no Terrible,” penned a fourth.
“Wait what?” questioned another.
“Man, can’t horror movies be without these backward wall climbing and flying around?” Inquired a sixth fan.
“OMG…why do demons always give these folks superpowers?? God, we need to talk,” demanded a seventh.
“Oh Lord, I’d be outta that room in a micro second,” joked someone else.
Another Netflix fan joked, “Bring on the nightmares!!!”
SCARY STUFF
Lee, 64, said on Bevy Smith‘s SiriusXM show that after reading about other supernatural happenings on the sets of films like The Exorcist and Poltergeist, he decided to have a deliverer on the set of The Deliverance.
Lee Daniels Films
Lee Daniels is a prolific director. He recently led the film The Deliverence, which premiered on Netflix. The movie is based on the real-life story of Latoya Ammons, an Indiana mom who became convinced her children were possessed by demons and their rental home was a portal to hell.
Here are some of the most famous films Lee Daniels has directed:
- The Deliverance
- The United States Vs. Billie Holiday
- The Butler
- The Paperboy
- Precious
- Shadow Boxer
The film follows a family in Indiana who discover demonic occurrences that leave them convince them and the people in their community that their house is a portal to hell.
Unfortunately, it seems it wasn’t enough to avoid some unusual happenings.
“Things happen, and I was not gonna let things happen on my set, and also I needed it for me,” he revealed.
“And so we prayed before every – and there’s those of us that don’t believe in prayer.”
He confessed that the circles were “really beautiful and I think that we needed it,” but things did indeed happen on the set regardless.
“And even with that, there were still things that happened on the set that was – my sister is in every movie that I’ve ever done as my good luck charm, and she was in the scene with Glenn [Close] in the chemo scene, and she’s the one that sort of gave her attitude in the chemo scene,” he said.
“And two days later, after being in the chemo scene, she was diagnosed with lung cancer – literally. My dog died on the set.”
Glenn Close, 77; Mo’Nique, 56; and Andra Day, 39, were also present for the town hall-style interview.
PRAY IT AWAY
Mo’Nique reminded the director that she also suffered some bad luck on set, sharing that she was hospitalized during filming.
“Mr. Daniels had me doing a scene, OK? And we’re outside,” she began.
“It was just, the demon was supposed to be on top of the building, so they kept blowing this – I mean, at one point I’m like, ‘Lee, do we have this s**t because I can’t breathe.’ They kept blowing. He was like, ‘One more time. One more time.’ So when I got finished, right, my thyroid was a big, I mean, it was just sick.”
She went on, “Oh baby. I was like, ‘What kind of s**t is this?’ It was a lot of things happening with The Deliverance.”
Glenn also chimed in, discussing the prayer circles.
She confessed that it was the first time she had ever seen “praying in a circle on a set.”
“Yes, with somebody, with the deliverer who spoke in tongues sometimes,” she recalled.
“I thought it was, it was incredible, but [Lee would] say, ‘Ok, we’re gonna pray now. Anybody wanna come? We’re gonna do it now.’ You know, so everybody knew what we were doing, and they would choose to come or not, and it didn’t matter.”
BASED IN TRUTH
As scary as The Deliverance and the on-set experiences were, the true story behind the film is even spookier.
According to USA Today, Lee’s favorite movie ever is The Exorcist.
He wanted to tackle a similar story, so he set his sights on the story of Latoya Ammons, who claimed her kids were victimized by demons.
“And my mom was like, ‘You bare your all and it’s on screen. Spirits can jump on you, and I don’t want you to do the film’,” he told the outlet.
He decided to move forward with it anyway.
“I believe we are in a dark time,” he said, telling USA Today that instead of a horror film he wanted to make a “faith-based thriller” that might help audiences connect to a higher power, whatever that might be.
“Whether it’s Buddah, wehther it’s Allah, whether it’s Jesus Christ, whether it’s you learning to love yourself more, we need to do that so that we can find peace. Tomorrow isn’t promised for any of us.”
Latoya’s story stared with black flies swarming the rental house she lived in, which then gave way to unexplained loud noises and shadowy figures appearing.
The Deliverance starts the same way, with bugs and foul odors emanating from the basement of a home.
Lee also explored dysfunction between Ebony, an alcoholic played by Andra Day, her three children, and her mom Alberta (Glenn Close).
“That sort of was a problem for Netflix in the beginning because they didn’t understand it,” Lee recalled.
“They wanted more jump scares. I don’t know how to make that kind of movie. It has to be grounded.”
He explained that it was more important to him to dive into “a bigger picture of what defines abuse, because [Ebony] definitely does with her kids, and the dysfunction that goes on in this family, which has passed down.”
“You think it’s Precious, but then it sort of makes a turn,” he added, referencing his previous film, also starring Mo’Nique.
In the film, Ebony’s youngest son, Andre – played by Anthony B. Jenkins – starts showing signs of demonic possession first, followed by brother Nate (Caleb McLaughlin) and Shante (Demi Singleton).
The children are part of unusual and violent incidents at school, and eventually find themselves in the hospital.
Incidents in the film were based on actual reported incidents, including a moment in which Andre climbs a wall in the hospital backward.
In the true story, Latoya’s mother witnessed her young grandson do something they couldn’t explain, along with a nurse and a case manager assigned to the family.
“Not only did they see it, but the social worker who was trying to take the kids from the mother said, ‘This actually happened’ to the judge,” Lee said.
“You can’t make it up.”
Latoya was investigated by child services and while she was found to be of “sound mind,” she lost custody of her kids.
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