I remember hearing about this film last year from Kevin Smith on his Fatman Beyond podcast. Smith raved about this from his friend David Dastmalchian. So I was excited to see this when I saw it coming out at Cinemark.

I can honestly say that I have not been as shaken or unsettled as much from a horror movie is quite some time. The creativity and originality of this film is off the charts and it strung me along in a beautiful manner.

The film starts off in a style of a documentary where the topic was a late night talk show in 1977 that wound up going off the charts. The main part of the film featured the Halloween episode of the Night Owls late night talk show and footage from behind the scenes recorded that night, which presented a picture of a tense and nerve-wrecking situation.

David Dastmalchian played Jack Delroy, the late night talk show host who was struggling to try and become the leader in ratings for late night shows, but who was always coming up short to Johnny Carson. The first fifteen to twenty minutes of the movie set up the background, much like a documentary might, including giving us details on Jack’s wife Madeleine (Georgina Haig), who had died about a year before.

Jack and the producers of his sinking show were looking for a way to recover from the dwindling ratings since the tragic death, and they were looking for this Halloween episode to really pull in the viewers. They stacked it up with some amazing people.

First, was the psychic Christou (Fayssal Bazzi), who was clearly pulling the old tricks of a fraudulent psychic, saying names and looking for people who might fit into the category. However, there were a couple of things that happen that make us wonder exactly what was going on.

Then, he brought out Carmichael Haig (Ian Bliss), a skeptic who would punch holes in the seemingly paranormal moments. Carmichael was a real jerk about it too, being very condescending and arrogant.

Things really picked up when Dr. June Ross-Mitchell (Laura Gordon) and the young girl Lily (Ingrid Torelli) took the stage to talk about Lily’s demon residing inside of her.

From this point on, this film just took off, as you were never sure what was going on, what was real or what was about to happen. The ending sequence, which I will not spoil, was totally off the charts and absolutely stunning. I was completely floored by the third act of this movie, both in the story telling aspect and the way it made me unnerved.

David Dastmalchian is perfect in the role of Jack. You can suspect that there is more to Jack than what you see, but he is so likable that you really want to believe in him and root for him to make it back to the top. Ingrid Torelli is utterly creepy as Lily. Her looks, her voice, everything about Lily was distressing.

Jack’s sidekick (much like Jimmy Kimmel’s Guillermo or Carson’s Ed McMahon) was named Gus (Rhys Auteri) and you could tell that he was just not sure that they should be doing what they were doing. Gus spoke to Jack as the audience spoke, and he was rebuked over and again.

This movie has a definite retro feel to it, and you believe everything that happens. I really loved this movie. It built amazingly from the beginning until the ending sequence. I can see the end being something that some people will not like, but I was utterly engaged and shaken by it.

This is streaming on Shudder in April, and I would recommend everyone to search it out. It takes the old sub-genres of found footage and demonic possession and brings a new life to them. It is a really great film, one of the best of the year.

4.85 stars