Late Night With the Devil: Was Success Worth it?

2023’s Late Night with the Devil took the festival circuit by storm. Written and directed by Colin and Cameron Caines, it stars character actor David Dastmalchian as Jack Delroy, host of late-night talk show Night Owls. For years and years, despite how much success Jack Delroy achieves, he has never been able to pass Johnny Carson in the ratings. This movie presents itself as the final episode of Night Owls, filmed on Halloween night, 1977. We follow Jack Delroy and his guests: Christou (Fayssal Bazzi); a psychic, Carmichael the Conjurer (Ian Bliss); a former magician turned skeptic, and the duo of Lilly D’Abo (Ingrid Torelli), and Dr. June Ross-Mitchell (Laura Gorden); Lily is the sole survivor of a satanic suicide cult, and Dr. Ross-Mitchell is a psychologist who interviewed Lilly and the ‘entity’ that exists inside her body for a book she has recently released. What follows is a standard late-night talk show that goes slowly off the rails.

This review will remain spoiler free.

The positives; David Dastmalchian is the biggest standout performance. The movie presents itself as a recovered tape of the final filming of this talk show, but also as a documentary. The movie has two different modes which it uses color and aspect ratio to differ. When the movie is on the talk show portions, it presents itself like an authentic 70s talk show. When they break for a commercial, the movie goes full screen and black and white and we see the façade of the confident talk show host suddenly crack, as the pain and the stress get to him. This night must be a success for him, for the show, and for the guests. Jack needs to surpass Johnny Carson, but is it worth the sacrifices he has made in the past and is willing to make for the future?

Another standout is Ingrid Torelli as Lilly. She does a wonderful job portraying an innocent little girl, with something horrible living under the skin. The actress does an amazing job with her voice and her body language. The scenes when the entity takes over her body and speaks, are some of the most effective creep outs to grace the screen in a while. I hope to see more of Torelli, she’s a young actress with a long career ahead of her.

The plot of the movie is also compelling. It opens itself as a documentary, narrated by Michael Ironside, where you learn about Jack being a member of a real life secret society (The Bohemain Grove), a Satanic cult named the Children of Abraxas, who have a connection to The Bohemain Grove, and a tragedy Jack has faced in his past. Now Jack needs this show to be a success, but can interviewing a possessed child on the air be enough? Will it be worth it? Only one way to find out.

This movie pairs well with the fantastic Ghostwatch and WNUF Halloween Special. While it doesn’t reach the highs that those reached, this is very much still worth checking out for the performances and how bonkers this movie gets.

However, no movie is perfect or without controversy.

The first negative would have to be some shoddy CGI. It stands out like a sore thumb when they use it and can be immersion breaking.

The second would have to be the third act. No spoilers in the review, but the movie does a few things in the third act to make you question the validity of what you are seeing on the camera. This can feel like a cop out or a cheap trick depending on who you are.

The last is the movies use of AI generated images. There are three times when the movie cuts to commercials, and they place a “Be Right Back” image on the screen. All three of those images are 100% AI generated and it’s obvious. They’re immersion breaking, and with talks of AI replacing human jobs, can leave a bad taste in the viewer’s mouth. It’s so bad that the AI controversy has taken over all discussion of the film. Which is a shame because the film has many positives. The fact that AI images that are used for less than 8 seconds of screen time has dominated the conversation of the movie says a lot about people’s feelings. For an indie production to resort to using AI to replace an artist also feels like a slap in the face to graphic designers who would be more than willing to work on the film. But the fact is the images are here to stay, and have left a massive stain on an otherwise great movie, so I have to ask the directors of the movie, just as I must ask Jeck Delory; was it worth it?

TW: Gore, Vomit, Flashing Lights

Review by Richard Gerlach

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