Late Night with the Devil
(2023) 93 min
Rated: R (Gore, language)
Country: Australia, United States, United Arab Emirates
Director: Cameron Cairnes, Colin Cairnes
Starring: David Dastmalchian, Laura Gordon, Ian Bliss, Ingrid Torelli, Michael Ironside
Links: IMDB | Wikipedia
Rating: ★★★★☆
A late night talk show host with failing ratings attempts to make his Halloween special one to remember.
Synopsis:
A narrator (Michael Ironside) gives us the backstory of a prominent late night tv host Jack Delroy (Dastmalchian). Jack has had a wonderful career, friends with rich and famous who go to an exclusive secret retreat called The Grove and is married to a wonderful woman named Madelaine Piper who suddenly gets terminal lung cancer and dies. After grieving for a while in seclusion Jack re-appears and continues his Night Owls show. The ratings, however, begin to fall.
Sweeps week begins Halloween night 1977 and Jack Delroy has a special program planned. The footage is presented to the viewer henceforth as newly uncovered found footage.
Jack Delroy does an intro monologue and then introduces his first guest which is a clairvoyant known as Christou. Christou attempts to do some cold-reading on the Night Owl audience but fumbles a bit. He is then able to talk to a mother and daughter who had a brother who committed suicide named Edmund.
After talking to the mother and daughter duo, Christou suddenly gets a painful shock of energy and screams that he has the name of Minnie and is asking if anyone can receive the message. No member of the audience is able to and a light flashes as a bulb pops. Christou crumples to the ground in pain. Jack breaks for a commercial as they take a break.
Christou is bleeding slightly from his nose, but fine. He stays on one of the chairs at the talk-show circle. The show producer, Leo Fiske, tells Jack that the Cavendish CEO and his wife are in the front row of the audience, but Jack is too rattled trying to put on a good show to try to kiss up to the show sponsors.
When the show returns the next guest is James Randi-like figure who was once a magician but now a skeptic called Carmichael Haig (Bliss). Car, as he is called, tells Jack how Christou is a charlatan who uses cold-reading to try to guess and connect with people. Christou gets upset and throws water in Car’s face. Jack calms down Christou and admits that Minnie is the private nickname he had for his wife Madelaine.
Christou gets very sick and starts vomiting black fluid on Car’s jacket. Jack’s show cuts to commercial.
During the break Carmichael tries to explain away how Christou might have faked throwing up. Jack is disturbed but carries on with the show. He tells the audience that Christou is getting medical treatment. He also tells them that he read the manuscript for a book about to be published called Conversations With The Devil by Dr. June Ross-Mitchell.
Jack shows a clip from a documentary that Dr. June’s research center produced. It’s about a cult called the First Church of Abraxas. In 1974 the cult has a stand-off with the FBI and the followers light themselves and the house on fire. A 10 year old girl named Lilly is the sole survivor. Lilly has a fragmented memory of her time with the cult. Her strange behavior causes the FBI to call on Dr. June to investigate Lilly.
Lilly (Torelli) and June (Gordon) are introduced onto the stage and Lilly seems confused, but cheerful and she reassures Jack that he will become famous. The show takes a commercial break.
June takes Jack aside and warns him that Lilly is acting unpredictable. Jack encourages unpredictable behavior since it’s a live show. Leo Fiske informs Jack that Christou died in the hospital.
When the show returns to air, Car questions the validity of June’s research and June explains that all new science is questioned at first. Lilly is possessed by a lesser demon that would server under Abraxas. Lilly calls the demon Mr. Wriggles. Jack pressures June to give a demonstration live on TV of the demon inhabiting Lilly. June hesitates but accepts. The show goes to commercial again so that the stage can be set.
June gets angry at Jack for pressuring her and Jack reminds her that the demonstration will help sell her book. Lilly is restrained to a chair and the show comes back on the air.
June sits across from Lilly and causes Lilly to fall asleep. Once asleep she asks Mr. Wiggles to come out. The demon emerges and is confused about the surroundings. He recognizes Jack and tells Jack that he and Jack are well acquainted since Jack’s time at The Grove. The demon mocks Jack and tells him June thinks he’s handsome and that now he’s free to sleep with anyone. June slaps Lilly and then the demon causes and electrical surge and the chair to levitate. The chair falls to floor and Lilly apologizes and June hugs her. Jack takes the show to a commercial break.
During the break Jack learns that the possession has got them the attention of the network heads. Car learns that Christou died and is checking out the stage. Jack helps cut the straps off Lilly with the cult ceremonial dagger which he leaves with him on stage.
Returning from commercial, Carmichael is allowed to question the validity of the events that happened on stage. He shows concern for Lilly’s sanity and June is offended because she is Lilly’s legal guardian. Jack defends Lilly and June. Carmichael says he can replicate the actions Lilly did through hypnosis. He picks Jack’s show side-kick Gus and sits across from him.
Car hypnotizes Gus into believing he has worms under his skin. And Gus, in disgust, removes his clothes and pulls at his skin, the worms spilling out. He crawls on the floor, his head exploding as a giant worm pops through his skull. Carmichael then wakes him from the trance. The audience and Jack watch the tape in disbelief as it is replayed without worms appearing. Carmichael accuses June of doing the same trick with Lilly to produce the same effects.
June wants to leave but Lilly wants to stay and prove what they’re saying is true. They play the tape of Lilly’s possession and a glitch is shown where Madelaine appears in a frame as a ghost. While they are watching the tape, Lilly becomes possessed and suddenly becomes charged with electricity.
Lilly screams and her head splits open and static electricity shoots out, she is now the demon. She kills Gus by twisting his neck as he tries to show her the cross around his neck. She chokes June by the cult necklace and slits her throat. She then melts Carmichael as he attempts to bargain with the demon after witnessing it kill others. The studio is in chaos and the audience is fleeing. The producer pulls Jack behind the stage.
Jack starts to relive various segments of his show while trying to break free. He realizes that in his effort to become famous while joining those rituals at The Grove, he sacrificed the life of his wife. Madelaine appears in a hospital bed, dying and asks him to end her suffering. The ritual cult knife is on the table beside him, so Jack plunges the knife into his wife, but then realizes he’s stabbed Lilly. He’s in the studio, alone surrounded by dead bodies. He keeps trying to wake up from hypnosis, but he isn’t asleep. He is awake, the horrible reality unfolds before him. He keeps repeating to himself “Dreamer, you’re awake.” as the camera cuts to black.
Review:
This film is a great new take on “found footage”. It’s a mockumentary with “never before seen footage” of what really went down during an infamous Halloween broadcast. This introduction with a glimpse into the life of Jack Delroy is peppered with references that will be referenced in the duration of the film. As the demon talks to Jack and Jack hallucinates his past, the audience will take a trip back to these spots. And at this point the film is no longer a “found footage” film. It becomes a normal horror film. So to some degree it loses a bit of charm.
The great controversy in the film is the use of AI art in some of the breaks. It’s easy to tell and I was distracted at that point in the film. Where they could easily hire an artist to create art for these break pieces, they went with AI. This is unacceptable and very disappointing. These bring the artistry of film down entirely when using such cheap methods that are especially obvious.
Again, I would have given this film a better score, but it was flawed and I can understand others marking it even lower for such things.
