I’ve always been slightly worried if the horror genre can possibly keep its effectiveness in these times of streaming, where pinpoint scares, creeping dread and careful composition may all be diluted by the fact that you can readily watch it in a brightly lit bathroom while going to the toilet. However, directors in the genre usually turn out to be rather a savvy bunch as they adapt the film to fit the format in a way that still (hopefully) garners the required effect and a fantastic example of this is the fiendishly resourceful Late Night With The Devil – a movie that turns a small screen (i.e television) to its advantage.
Essentially taking the found footage feel of The Blair Witch Project and breeding it the fake talk show format of Alan Partridge or Man To Man With Dean Learner, directing siblings Cameron and Colin Cairnes have turned in a near unique experience that delivers a blast of 70s satanic panic that dares to change the channel on it.
It’s Halloween back in 1977, and struggling late-night talk show host Jack Delroy is pulling out all the stops in order to halt the steady decline in ratings that’s widening the ever present gap between his show, Night Owls, and the Tonight Show With Johnny Carson. Previous attempts to become king of the talk show hill has involved him interviewing his cancer ridden wife live on air only to see him still come in a close second, but after a brief break from the screen following her death, Jack has returned with a plan to finally topple his rival.
Featuring a line up that opens with Christou, a man who claims to be able to communicate with the spirits of the departed, and former magician turned professional skeptic, Carmichael Haig, Jack hopes to ensnare viewers with his secret weapon; June Ross-Mitchell and Lilly D’Abo, a parapsychologist and the subject of her local book, a young girl who survived the mass suicide of a cult who worshiped the demon Abraxas. Not only does he plan to interview June and Lilly about their findings, but, live in front of a studio audience, he audaciously intends to get the scientist to invoke the demonic entity – dubbed Mr. Wriggles – that apparently lurks within the child in order to interview it, thus making television history.
Things start out seemingly calm enough with Christou doing a fairly standard cold reading act and Carmichael arrogantly disputing it while offering a check for half a million dollars to anyone who can prove the supernatural. However, despite the odd, alarming happenstance – surely Christou suddenly projectile vomiting black goo couldn’t have been on the itinerary – matters start to get immediately tense when June and Lilly are wheeled out to polite applause. As the broadcast goes on a string of events unfold that seemingly defy explanation – despite Carmichael’s best efforts – but when things inevitably get out of control, things from Jack’s questionable past come back to haunt him.
Before I descend into a predictable gush-fest, I feel I should pick out the handful of flaws I had, just to afford the minimum amount of journalistic integrity I believe I have, because virtually everything about Late Night With The Devil feels so incredibly fresh. Firstly, while the ad campaign cheekily suggests that everything “actually happened”, it holds about as much water as the similar claims made in the opening credits of the Coen Brothers’ Fargo. To be fair, the movie actually doesn’t even try to convince you that anything about this movie could even be remotely true (casting such a familiar face as David Dastmalchian is an immediate giveaway) and the “uncovered”, behind the scenes footage that keeps the drama going during commercial breaks is in suspiciously high definition and has way too many setups to convince a thirteen year old child – but this all simply is in the tongue in cheek fun of it all.
The main name of the game here is dread; a slow burning, gut twisting conviction that something is about to go horribly wrong, and it steadily builds throughout all the usual, chat show fluff that strives to keep a straight face.
The set up is superlative as a stern, gravelly voiceover (delivered by Michael Ironside, no less) brings us up to speed on the life and times of Jack Delroy to handily deliver all the pertinent backstory we could possibly need. From there, Dastmalcian tags in to give possibly one of his finest performances to date as the desperate host and even if Late Night With The Devil wasn’t an utterly captivating chiller, it still scores high marks for gifting a lead role to an actor who’s fast becoming this generation’s Vincent Price. As Jack Delroy, the prolific thespian manages to perfectly tap in to that almost painful earnestness that a lot of chat show hosts have, firing off a toothy grin and a cheesy one liner to effortlessly help the show glide over any speed bumps, but as the creepy shizzle rises, the true depths of his ambition mercilessly catches up with him. It’s a,daring balancing act – to be both vunerable and ruthless – but Dastmalchian pulls it off which still hosting a “live” show.
He’s got some good help too, with Ian Bliss (Bane from the Matrix sequels) providing us with a splendidly hissable, cigar chewing, debunker to dislike while the real danger is under our nose all along and you’ll find your hands balling into fists with every patronising comment or arched eyebrow.
While there’s other support from Rhys Auteri’s worried sidekick and Laura Gordon’s uncertain parapsychologist, the real thrust of the film proves to be that atmosphere that, by the final third proves to be as thick as smog. If I’m being totally honest, I’m not entirely sure how the Cairnes Brothers manage to stir up such legitimate tension with a chat show format, but the scenes where the host first converses with Mr. Wriggles or when Carmichael carries out a horrific example involving hypnosis and a crippling phobia of worms, you find yourself locked onto the screen like your soul depended on it.
Does the film kind of unspool a little bit in an utterly mental climax that sees heads split, throats tear and one guy melt like an Indiana Jones nazi? Yeah, a bit, but it doesn’t manage to disrupt everything that the film has achieved up to that point and I feel that the film may oddly be better suited to the small screen. Fans of the legendary BBC broadcast, Ghostwatch, may claim inferiority, but those who bemoan that there’s no original horror films being made desperately need to check their local listings and tune in to Late Night With The Devil.
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We Have Issues 
I’ll stick with Ghost Watch.
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