REVIEW: ‘Late Night With The Devil’ Is A Horror Great

Late Night With The Devil is your new favorite Halloween horror film. Set on October 31, 1977, audiences watch a rediscovered recording of Jack Delroy’s (David Dastmalchian) late-night syndicated talk show “Night Owls.”  A voice for the insomniacs around the country, Jack has never been the same since his wife died. After her tragic and unexpected death, his ratings have plummeted. The only thing that can save him is a Halloween special. Bringing in a medium (Fayssal Bazzi), a skeptic (Ian Bliss), a possessed girl (Ingrid Torelli) and her caretaker (Laura Gordon), Jack is unaware he is about to unleash evil into the living rooms of America.

At first, the ‘70s talkshow aesthetic seems like a gimmick or a crutch. But as the film devolves, the setting and format become a powerful vehicle for understanding the story. Jack’s status as a late night TV host is central to the film and all the intricacies of the time period, like hypnotherapy and spiritualism ala Ed and Lorraine Warren.

Beautifully shot and vibrantly colored when on-air, Late Night With The Devil keeps you guessing. The audience knows the guillotine is about to fall, but we don’t know when or how. Utilizing the resident skeptics, the Cairnes duo allows the film to ramp up tension. Tinged with weirdness from the beginning, Late Night With The Devil is an astonishing feat. It continues to show the caliber of horror film that Shudder acquires for distribution.

By confining the film to one sound stage, Late Night With The Devil pushes its actors. Without skipping a beat, the film starts as a satire before morphing into a nerve-wracking horror show. The set, costumes, language, and the practical effects work. Everything screams the period that is on display. More importantly, it feels like something you’ve stumbled upon. Director and writer Cameron and Colin Cairnes have made a stellar film that works as a time capsule as much as a modern horror film.

Dastmalchian, the film’s anchor, is marvelous. He’s charismatic, messy, and he is breaking over the course of the film. Still grieving his dead wife, Dastmalchian’s Jack Delroy is a shell of a man, but he’s good at his hosting job. He can bob and weave as the audience refuses to go as planned. But when the dead begin to speak, and Mr. Wiggles comes out to join the show, Jack falls apart even if he’s about to become an absolute legend with this dangerous rating spike.

Late Night With The Devil is exquisitely paced. The story unfolds in real-time throughout one late-night show recording. At just 93 minutes, the film is the perfect length and doesn’t sacrifice any character-building because of it. By introducing the film with Jack’s background, the quick exposition sets up all of the dominoes that are about to fall. We know the stakes and who Jack is. We know his loss, and we know that nothing is going to go as planned. Entering the film with this found footage weight hanging over it is expertly exploited.

In addition to Jack, Ingrid Torelli’s Lilly is funny and creepy in the way only good horror kids can be. The possessed girl, the potential of what she can be, hovers over the story. Instead of using her explicitly, the games played around her ramp up the tension.

Late Night With The Devil nails comedy and horror in equal measure despite drawing a quick line between the two as the film hits its halfway point. Another horror jewel in Dastmalchian’s crown, this film is unlike anything you’ve seen and worth watching on the biggest screen.

Late Night With The Devil was screened as a part of the 2024 SXSW Film & Television Festival is playing in theaters nationwide now, and will hit Shudder via IFC Midnight on April 12, 2024.