A live television broadcast in 1977 goes horribly wrong, unleashing evil into the nation’s living rooms.

‘Late Night with the Devil’ is a supernatural horror movie from directing brothers Colin and Cameron Cairnes, about a late night talk show host that invites a supposedly possessed girl on to his struggling show in an attempt to boost its flagging ratings. The framing device is of a narrator (Michael Ironside) looking back on this infamous episode, with a bit of documentary style context on the host Jack Delroy (David Dastmalchian) first before we go straight into the ‘episode’ itself in a found footage format. Every so often a film comes along that you haven’t heard much about and leaves an impression, and ‘Late Night with the Devil’, I’m pleased to report, hits the mark in this regard.

The first positive thing to say is that the movie gives us a pitch perfect recreation of a low budget 1970s talk show, with David Dastmalchian excellent as the ambitious but troubled host Jack Delroy. It captures the kitschy nature of these shows, and in this Halloween episode, there’s additional mileage for the crew and audience in playing up the spooky angle with guests including a psychic and a sceptic before we get on to the supposedly possessed girl. The best thing I can say about it is I was actually enjoying it as a ‘talk show’ before we even got on to the horror elements! We’ve all seen possession horror movies before and I would say there’s not a lot to surprise here in how the story plays out, but the enjoyment comes in the cleverly satirical tone and the craftsmanship on display in how the premise is executed. It’s pretty short at under 90 minutes and to be honest, I would perhaps have welcomed it being a little longer to spend more time on the TV set.

The obvious comparison from a non-horror perspective would be the 1970s movie ‘Network’, itself also a satire of TV executives chasing ratings, and I liked the cynicism that permeated the movie – particularly in the interactions between Jack and his producer Leo (Josh Quong Tart), who is pushing and pushing for Jack to take more risks to stand out from the crowd. I had a blast watching ‘Late Night with the Devil’ – it’s clearly been made with a lot of passion, and between the nifty, well delivered premise and David Dastmalchian’s perfectly judged lead performance, I really enjoyed it.

Rating: 4/5

Directed By: Colin & Cameron Cairnes

Starring: David Dastmalchian, Laura Gordon, Ian Bliss, Fayssal Bazzi, Ingrid Torelli, Rhys Auteri, Nicole Chapman, Georgina Haig, Josh Quong Tart and Michael Ironside

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt14966898/