Directed By Cameron and Colin Cairnes

Starring – David Dastmalchian, Laura Gordon, Ian Bliss

The Plot – A live television broadcast in 1977 goes horribly wrong, unleashing evil into the nation’s living rooms.

Rated R for violent content, some gore, and adult language including a sexual reference.

Late Night with the Devil: Official Trailer | Shudder (youtube.com)

POSITIVES

In terms of immersive elements, the film is one of the most artistically ambitious that I have seen in quite sometime, seamlessly emulating the pacing of presentation and imagery of 70’s broadcasts with picture perfect precision that legitimizes its authenticity factors, instead of just feeling like a 2024 production playing make believe. Between the 4:3 boxed in aspect ratio, variety of promos and station placemats during commercial breaks, and of course the mundane monotony of the color grading inside of the movie’s cinematography, the film offers a compelling and refreshing trip down memory lane, to perhaps a simpler time in television broadcasts, all the while surmizing something in atmospheric temperature that constantly feeds into the unnerving elements of artificiality that plague this and other talk show variety hours of the particular age. This leads to the overtly comedic dependency in dialogue and material, that intentionally matches ineffective consistencies as a crutch for Jack Delroy to suppress the intensity of his guests making the impossible possible, but beyond that only further appraises the ambiguity and phoniness within the depths of our protagonist that continuously make him a wild card to coherently interpret. Because of such, the laughs are intentionally limited, meant to make you groan, if anything, from the abundance of on-the-nose punchlines that outline many comedians who have made the transition to late night talk show host, all with varying degrees of detectibility that, as expected, grow less prominent the deeper we dive into this night of catastrophic mayhem, where it’s transcended with the kind of overwhelming fear and paranoia propaganda that colorfully result in the film’s expressive elements of horror. This is where the brothers Cairnes leave a lasting impression with their single biggest production to date, articulating an anything-goes kind of vibe to late night programming that speaks volumes to the freakshow that attracted audiences by the dozen with the taboo’s of TV that were only hinted at to that time. Because of such, the brothers balance the respective tones of comedy and horror incredibly with the overwhelming message of the perils within the price of fame that the movie comes full circle in articulating, providing a capitalized opportunity that will certainly provide them with bigger and even more daring projects to come, but also in a fearlessness to finality within the movie’s high stakes climax that will undoubtedly divide audiences. More on that in a second. The performances also rise to the occasion, with Dastmalchian providing another wildly eccentric turn to a career filled with so many vibrant personalities, and Ingrid Torelli momentarily stealing the show with the single most gripping possession in a film since Charisma Carpenter made the Earth shake in 2004’s “The Exorcism of Emily Rose”. Dastmalchian channels all of the charisma and showmanship of a talk show host, with an underlining edginess of ambiguity that often makes him a wild card to morally predict, and while Torelli is only utilized during a few key scenes, they are undoubtedly the ones that audiences will remember most firmly after they’ve finished it, where the 12-year-old actress captivates with enough bodily anguish and unbridled confidence in delivery that feels freshly diverse from anything else that we’ve seen from a possession performance to this point. Lastly, while the storytelling matches much of the same inconsistencies of the aforementioned special effects, the good parts pertain to the framing of a skeptical disbeliever, and his quest to prove everything that he and the audience experiences is of something manufactured by those involved. It’s a bit of an audience manifestation within the film, as we match knowledge depth with him in the things that we can only see before us, but does allow him to equally serve as a gauge to the measurement of the madness that eventually takes the film down some pretty unpredictable avenues of exploration, leading to a full-on unglued moment where his own theories are disproven, and the overwhelming vulnerability factors for him and these characters begin to take shape. The performance from Bliss is intentionally a bit over-the-top as a smug know-it-all of sorts, but it doesn’t lessen his appeal or tremendous value to the proceedings, in turn cementing him as the focus of consistent attention, especially when paranormal matters outside of his realm of comfort begin to shape and contort his very condensed perspective on the matters of possession.

NEGATIVES

Not everything kept me glued to the tube, as a few key hinderances between the cloth of a compelling product momentarily distanced me from my engagement, keeping me underwhelmed with various pay-offs that further withered away my patience. To be fair, I was never bored with the engagement, as I found myself curious with where the madness would break-off at any given point, but the journey in getting there a slow and plodding one, particularly during the film’s opening narration and corresponding opening half hour, which unloaded a truckload of exposition, instead of first-hand experiences alongside Jack in a way that would endear him to the audience. This left me feeling a bit disconnected with the protagonist in ways that kept me from ever fully investing into him and his plight, and with the repetition of this overload of exposition during the film’s closing moments, it throws a lot at the audience during the moments the insight has little time to properly stick towards anything meaningful with the deliveries. This leads to an aforementioned climax that I wasn’t fully sold on, both with the abundance of exposition unloaded unnaturally during the film’s closing moments, but also a metaphorical evolution that completely overtakes a real time persistence throughout the entirety of the film. While I totally understand what the Cairnes were going for with regards to the ages old idea of selling your soul for fame, the execution here doesn’t feel transparent with its big reveals, in turn leading to an inevitable bit of disappointment to a closing exclamation point that honestly felt very underwhelming with the extent of the journey to this point. Finally, I previously commended the practical effects for brandishing an element of tangibility and influence to scenes they effectively accompanied, but the disappointing side of that balance stems from an overindulgence of A.I-generated art during the film’s climax that didn’t look artistically endearing or at the very least believable from the imagery that they were summoning. While I understand that pulling off sequences like this with a naturalistic look would add millions to the bulk of a rumored 15 million dollar budget, it’s money well spent, especially since the practical effects permeate such a naturalistic element to the imagery and environments they seamlessly accommodate, as to where the experiments with artificial intelligence appraised an unintentionally humorous appeal to imagery that, as intended, should shake you to your very core.

OVERALL
“Late Night With the Devil” occasionally takes on dead air with a combination of prolonged pacing and a divisive climax that certainly won’t please all audiences, but it is a mostly successful experiment in immersive entertainment that seamlessly emulates the air of authenticity inside of its 70’s broadcast framing. With a dynamic Dastmalchian lead performance, as well as the brothers Cairnes’ triggering all of the paranoia and hysteria of a fearful generation obsessed with evil, the film is a delightfully dark dapper into the mayhem of late-night television, leading us down a twisted winding road of sinister psychologies that answers the cost of fame with the steepest of prices.

My Grade: 7/10 or B