Late Night with the Devil (2023)

• Directed by Cameron Cairnes, Colin Cairnes
• Written by Cameron Cairnes, Colin Cairnes
• Stars David Dastmalchian, Laura Gordon, Ian Bliss, Fayssal, Bazzi
• Run Time: 1 Hour, 33 Minutes
• Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YeKYfneOH3o

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

They did an excellent job of taking us back to the 1970s with the retro look and feel of a late night talk show/variety show. There’s quite a long introduction narrating a fictional history of the Jack Delroy and his “Night Owls” show that was a competitor to Johnny Carson. Then we view a Halloween episode of the show that starts out normal and gets wilder and weirder as it goes on. We thought the ending was a little weaker than the rest of it, but we still liked it a lot.

Spoilery Synopsis

We get an early 70’s news montage as the narrator tells us that TV broadcasts the chaos. It’s April 1971, and a new late-night show, “Night Owls” premieres. The host of the brand-new sho, Jack Delroy comes out and makes a joke about everyone watching Johnny Carson instead. 

Time passes, and we see that the show is a hit. We’re told that he’s a member of “The Grove,” a sort of secret society in California. Jack wants to beat out Carson as the main late-night show, but he can’t get there. In 1976, Jack’s wife gets lung cancer and comes onto the show, but even that doesn’t beat Carson; she died two weeks later. 

Jack disappears for a month and then returns. The ratings start to fall, and it looks like his contract may not be renewed. It’s now Halloween night in 1977, and more importantly, it’s sweeps week. We are told that it was the live TV event that shocked the nation. Credits roll. 

Jack and his co-host, Gus, have some lame banter. Jack tells the audience about the importance of sweeps week. He starts talking about popular interest in the occult, and their first guest is a spiritualist-medium, Christou. Christou talks about hearing the voices of the dead and the relevance to Halloween. 

Christou goes into a trance, and it all looks like a generic staged mind-reading trick. Then he talks to a woman in the audience about a relative who killed himself; it all seems very serious this time, but it’s probably just fake. They get ready to go to a commercial when Christou suddenly has some kind of seizure and screams. The power goes crazy and Christou’s eyes go glassy; his nose bleeds. Then he says the spirit is gone, and they go to a commercial. 

The next guest is Carmichael the Conjurer, a former stage magician who is now a professional skeptic and paranormal investigator. He says the world would be more interesting if the supernatural were real, but he’s never found anything real. He even offers a fortune for real proof. Christou has a coughing fit as Carmichael explains Christou’s trick and calls him a fraud and liar. 

Jack admits that the scary reading from Christou may have been from Madeleine, his dead wife. Christou is looking really sick as Carmichael tries to scoff. Christou pukes green slime all over the stage and Carmichael. They immediately cut to another commercial. 

When they return, Jack says that Christou is being seen by a doctor. Carmichael still thinks it was all a trick. Jack introduces the next guest, June Ross-Mitchell, the author of “Conversations with the Devil.” Jack thinks the book was profoundly disturbing. We cut to a recorded interview with Szandor D’Abo, the head of a Satanic cult. We watch clips of a ritual for the demon Abraxis. There was an eventual FBI standoff with the cult, and they all died in a mass suicide except for young Lilly, a strange girl. 

June and Lilly come out on stage, and Lilly is weird from the get-go. She says Jack is going to be very famous, very soon, and that he shouldn’t worry about his ratings. At the break, June tells Jack that this is all a bad idea; Lilly is getting more and more unpredictable. The producer, Leo, tells Jack that Christou died in the ambulance. 

When they return, Jack asks June what a parapsychologist is. Carmichael is still there, and he’s rude. She tells of her work with Lilly to figure out the demon that lurks within her. June and Carmichael argue. They’ve brought some things: a dagger, skull, and a few other items. Lilly says that “Mr. Wriggles” wriggles his way out of her from time to time. 

Gus’s theremin goes berserk and shatters the glasses on the table. Lilly says Mr. Wriggles did it; Jack wants to talk to Mr. Wiggles. June says it’s a bad idea, but the others pressure her to summon the demon– after the commercial break. Gus and Jack argue about how weird Jack has been tonight and that he’s messing with things that he shouldn’t. 

When they return to the show, June explains what’s going to happen to Lilly, who is strapped to a chair. She brings the demon out of Lilly very easily. Lilly’s face changes, and she talks in a different voice. She says she and Jack go way back; they met in the tall trees. She says Jack and June have been sleeping together, and June smacks her. Things quickly escalate to “full Exorcist,” right on camera as Lilly’s chair levitates and electrical disturbances fly around the studio. Jack interrupts, shaken. Carmichael wants to debunk it all. No, it’s time for another commercial. 

Jack thinks the show is going really great; he releases Lilly’s straps. Gus tells Carmichael what happened to Christou– that wasn’t fake. Leo says that some of the crew have walked off, but the FCC wants to meet in the morning. This could be huge. 

After the break, Jack apologizes to anyone who might have been offended by the televised demon possession. He talks to Lilly, who says it was like being asleep and awake at the same time. Jack wants to hear Carmichael explain it away.

Carmichael wants to re-enact the demon possession using Gus as a subject. He pulls out a spinning pocket watch and hypnotizes Gus and the audience. Then he asks Gus about his fear of worms; that seems random, but he’s right. Gus talks about how hot and itchy he is, and then he starts pulling worms out of his neck. He rips open his belly, and hundreds of worms pour out. Carmichael snaps his fingers, but it doesn’t stop. Gus turns into a big pile of worms, but then Carmichael manages to end the trick. It’s all fine. Jack wants the whole thing replayed from tape; it’s completely different from what everyone remembers. 

Jack has to admit it was a fine trick, but June insists that she didn’t hypnotize anyone. Lilly suggests playing her part of the show back from tape as well; it’s exactly what we saw previously, so it wasn’t a matter of hypnosis. They slow the tape down, and Jack sees the ghost of his dead wife standing behind him. On the stage, Lillt starts to shake, and things get weird again. 

Lilly’s head bursts open, and fire pours out. She kills Gus, and the audience stampedes for the door. June and Jack get thrown around the stage. June has her throat cut open. Carmichael finally believes before bursting into flames. Leo pulls Jack out the back door. 

“Station Difficulties” appears on the screen. 

Gus introduces Jack onto the show; it’s a new episode. Jack doesn’t know why he’s there or how he got there. It’s all very ominous. He reappears in segments that we’ve seen clips of before, only they all go badly. Jack tells the audience to “Turn off your televisions.” We cut to Jack signing papers for the studio as cultists attend. “Jack’s greatest sacrifice is yet to come.” Szandor D’Abo is there, and he congratulates Jack. A door opens, and Jack sees Madeleine on her deathbed. She says that he had to pay a price to become #1. 

“It wasn’t supposed to turn out this way,” he cries. He picks up the dagger from the table and stabs her.

Back on the set, in the real world, Jack has stabbed  Lilly. Everyone else is dead.

Commentary

The first nine minutes are pure exposition and flashback, telling us Jack’s backstory. It’s a very realistic interpretation of a 70’s talk show, except I don’t remember any of them being this entertaining in real life. 

It starts out pretty simple but escalates quickly and gets really weird. We really liked this one!