Lionsgate Signs on to DELIVER US FROM EVIL

SANTA MONICA, Calif., July 13 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Lionsgate , the leading independent filmed entertainment studio, announced today it has acquired domestic distribution rights to DELIVER US FROM EVIL, a documentary about a pedophile Catholic priest whose serial rapes were known to, and concealed by, the American Church for over 30 years. The feature film debut by Emmy Award-winning writer/director Amy Berg, DELIVER US FROM EVIL made its world premiere at the Los Angeles Film Festival, where it won the top nonfiction prize, the Target Documentary Award. The film is the first production from Berg's company, Disarming Films, and was produced by Berg, Hermass Lassalle and Frank Donner. DELIVER US FROM EVIL is slated for a Fall 2006 release. The announcement was made by Lionsgate President of Theatrical Films Tom Ortenberg.

"DELIVER US FROM EVIL is a powerful and important film, and we at Lionsgate are very proud to be associated with it," said Ortenberg. "Clearly this is an unusually emotional story, and Amy Berg handles it with great restraint and sensitivity. Yet she does not flinch in her reporting, and has created a devastating portrait of a sexual predator and the official culture that enabled him to victimize the children and families that trusted him. We believe the tremendous response we saw at the L.A. Film Festival is going to be echoed throughout the country."

Said Berg, "Lionsgate has no peer as an advocate of topical documentaries, and I'm gratified by their commitment to my film. They understand the intricacies of marketing a film like this, and I know they'll spare no effort in bringing DELIVER US FROM EVIL to the widest possible audience."

DELIVER US FROM EVIL traces the destructive path of Father Oliver O'Grady, the most notorious pedophile priest in the modern history of the Catholic Church. Over the course of 20 years, O'Grady sexually molested hundreds of boys and girls in Northern California under the knowing eye of Church hierarchs, who simply shuttled him from one parish to the next. A broad spectrum of brave abuse survivors and Oliver O'Grady himself tell the whole truth of their stories and how their experiences impacted their lives. As it investigates how and why Church leaders like Los Angeles Cardinal Roger Mahony allowed O'Grady's crimes to continue unchecked, DELIVER US FROM EVIL uncovers answers that go all the way up to the Pope and all the way back to the Fourth Century.

The deal was negotiated for Lionsgate by Ortenberg and Jason Constantine, Senior Vice President of Acquisitions, and by Josh Braun and Craig Emanuel, on behalf of Disarming Films. Berg is repped by Endeavor.

ABOUT LIONSGATE

Lionsgate is the leading independent filmed entertainment studio, winning this year's Best Picture Academy Award(R) for Crash, generating two consecutive years of $300 million-plus domestic theatrical box office, operating a $500 million-plus home entertainment business and producing a broad slate of prime time television series for fiscal 2007. It is a premier producer and distributor of motion pictures, television programming, home entertainment, family entertainment, and video-on-demand content. Its prestigious and prolific library of more than 5,500 titles is a valuable source of stable, recurring revenue and a foundation for the growth of the Company's core businesses. The Lionsgate brand is synonymous with original, daring, quality entertainment in markets around the world.

http://www.lionsgate.com/ * * * * * For further information, contact: Sarah Greenberg 310-255-3856 sgreenberg@lionsgate.com Russell Nelson 310-255-3858 rnelson@lionsgate.com For corporate inquiries, please contact: Peter D. Wilkes pwilkes@lionsgate.com 310-255-3726