Late Night with the Devil

Late Night with the Devil is a 2023 horror film written, directed and edited by Australian siblings Cameron and Colin Cairnes, and executive produced by Joel Anderson, Rami Yasin, and David Dastmalchian.
An international co-production of Australia and the United Arab Emirates, Late Night with the Devil had its world premiere at the South by Southwest Film Festival (SXSW) on 10 March 2023. The film received generally positive reviews from critics.
Premise
Presented in a found footage style, David Dastmalchian stars as Jack Delroy, the host of a fictional 1970s variety and late-night talk show titled Night Owls with Jack Delroy. The film purports to be derived from a rediscovered master tape of an episode from the show's sixth season, broadcast on Halloween 1977; during this live television broadcast, havoc unfolds when Delroy interviews a parapsychologist (Laura Gordon) and the subject of her recent book, a young teenager (Ingrid Torelli) who was the sole survivor of a Satanic church's mass suicide.
Cast
David Dastmalchian as Jack Delroy
Laura Gordon as Dr. June Ross-Mitchell, a parapsychologist and author
Ian Bliss as Carmichael the Conjurer, a former magician turned skeptic
Fayssal Bazzi as Christou, a psychic
Ingrid Torelli as Lilly
Rhys Auteri
Georgina Haig
Josh Quong Tart
Production
Development and casting
Production on Late Night with the Devil was announced on 13 February 2022, with the Emirati studio Image Nation and the American genre label Spooky Pictures attached. Describing their decision to base Late Night with the Devil around a late-night talk show, writer-director duo Cameron and Colin Cairnes stated: "In the '70s and '80s, there was something slightly dangerous about late-night TV. Talk shows in particular were a window into some strange adult world. We thought combining that charged, live-to-air atmosphere with the supernatural could make for a uniquely frightening film experience."
The Cairnes brothers offered the role of Jack Delroy to David Dastmalchian after reading an article Dastmalchian wrote for the magazine Fangoria about regional TV horror hosts. Dastmalchian accepted the part after being sent a lookbook designed to resemble a 1970s TV Guide, along with the film's script. Dastmalchian's casting was announced on 24 June 2022.
Filming
Late Night with the Devil was shot in Melbourne, Australia. The film utilizes practical special effects, including puppetry, along with digital visual effects.
Release
Late Night with the Devil had its world premiere at the South by Southwest Film Festival (SXSW) on 10 March 2023, in Austin, Texas, United States, where it played as part of the festival's "Midnighters" section. That same month, horror author Stephen King was provided with an advance screener of the film, and he called it "absolutely brilliant. I couldn't take my eyes off it. Your results may vary, as they say, but I urge you to watch it when you can." The film screened at the Sydney Film Festival on 9, 11 and 15 June 2023.
In October 2023, IFC Films and Shudder acquired the distribution rights for North America, United Kingdom and Ireland.
Reception
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, Late Night with the Devil has an approval rating of 100% based on 31 reviews, with an average rating of 8.3/10. The site's consensus reads: "Innovative and engaging, Late Night with the Devil is a '70s-set horror treat with satirical bite -- and a too-rare showcase for David Dastmalchian in a leading role." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 71 out of 100 based on 4 critics' reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews".
Varietys Dennis Harvey commended the film's production design and technical aspects, as well as the performances of the cast, and wrote that the film's "mix of vintage Me Decade showbiz cheese and Exorcist-y demonic doings is distinctive, not to mention deftly handled by the [Cairnes] brothers as both writers and directors." Brian Tallerico of RogerEbert.com praised the film as inventive and its use of the found footage format as clever, and highlighted Dastmalchian's "phenomenally committed performance [...] really holding the film together as he finds the right tone between smarmy and likable that dominated so much '70s culture."
Meagan Navarro of Bloody Disgusting gave the film a score of three-and-a-half out of five, criticizing the film's pacing as rapid but writing that "the ingenuity, the painstaking period recreation, a riveting performance by Dastmalchian, and a showstopper of a finale make for one Halloween event you won't want to miss." Trace Sauveur of The Austin Chronicle also praised Dastmalchian's performance and called the film "totally gimmicky, but the sincere commitment to the conceit is what really makes this work." Sauveur adds that, despite finding the film's conclusion lacking, "Late Night with the Devil is able to mine plenty of effective and fun ideas out of its premise, and it works as a potent examination of the price of success."
References
External links
2020s English-language films
2023 films
2023 horror films
Australian horror films
Australian supernatural horror films
Emirati horror films
English-language Emirati films
Films shot in Melbourne
Films set in New York (state)
Films set in 1977
Films about television people
Films about Satanism
Demons in film
Halloween horror films