Late Night With The Devil (2023)

I am coming late to LATE NIGHT WITH THE DEVIL. It’s my own fault I thought this was the American version of foreign film that had played the festival circuit a year before. Because I was mistaken I didn’t jump to see this when I had the chance.

The film tells the story of a late night talk show host who seeks to curb  his falling ratings with a spooky Halloween night show involving, skeptics, psychics and demons. The film is supposed to be a mix of behind the scenes footage and the actual broadcast.

I liked LATE NIGHT, but I’m not as crazy in love with it the way many of my fellow writers and horror fans are. Part of the problem is that I really didn’t find it scary. To me it’s more a create horror comedy then a chill packed film. Until the end when all hell breaks loose I didn’t think it really worked as chiller.

The problems come from a few places. The first is the  film never quite nails the TV show feeling. I grew up on 1970’s talk shows, and any time there was a serious subject on them there were less jokes. Even shows where they would debunk a psychic or do something spooky, they would play it straight up to a point. There wouldn’t be as many attempts at humor here. I think part of the problem is that the directors never fully sell the idea that Night Owl was a real show, with it looking kind of anemic (not anything that would serious compete with the Tonight Show) and handling it jokey. The clips feel like clips and not something cut from a show. I never believed it was real for a second.

The other HUGE problem is the character of the skeptic.  Big loud and obnoxious, he is actually the villain of the piece not the demon. Played as a bull in a China closet he is not anyone who would end up as a repeated guest on a TV show. He would turn off viewers. His efforts to debunk what was happening resemble nothing that any skeptic I ever saw do on TV. When someone like the Amazing Randi took on someone he duplicated the feat, not brow beat them. Nothing he does rings true, at least in terms of TV in 1977.

The final problem with the film is the film, which is supposed to be a kind of found footage story, breaks the rules all over the place.  We see things that we never could have scene, from backstage conversations that would not have been filmed, to things that are happening inside characters, to images of the destruction that couldn’t have happened because the TV show camera men fled.  This is a minor  issue that only arises because the film states at the start that this is the broadcast as it happened with behind the scenes footage inserted.  If it hadn’t said that it would have been fine.

Don’t get me wrong, I like the film, with the final explosion of carnage being really cool, but I didn’t find it scary.

Worth a look.