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FANTASIA 2023: APOCRYPHA CANDIDATE: LATE NIGHT WITH THE DEVIL (2023)

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DIRECTED BY: Cameron Cairnes, Colin Cairnes

FEATURING: , Laura Gordon, Ian Bliss, Ingrid Torelli

PLOT: In a bid to renew his contract, not-quite-popular-enough talk show host Jack Delroy pulls out one stop too many for his “sweeps week” Halloween broadcast.

WHY IT SHOULD MAKE THE APOCRYPHA: There is madness, realism, grubby dealing, and demonic intrusion. And plenty of humor. This was my fourth feature of the day, so I may have been addled already, but the increasingly wobbly stack of macabre craziness and moral compromise left me (very pleasantly) jittery as I emerged from this fast-paced little horror gem.

COMMENTS: Pinch me, I’m nightmaring.

That does not quite work, but do you know what does? That’s right: the Cairnes Brothers’ Late Night With the Devil. From the brown-drab authenticity of the broadcast television set, to the sideburns and wide collars, to the obliging gullibility of the live studio audience, and (particularly) to David Dastmalchian’s at-long-last-leading-man turn as Jack Delroy. And it nearly slipped my mind somehow, but this is a “found footage” horror story; one that is actually interesting from start to finish. (Perhaps the weirdest thing that could be said of any found footage yarn.)

After a brief introduction covering Jack Delroy’s rise to late night television stardom, the film unfolds in real time as the Halloween episode of “Night Owls …with Jack Delroy” kicks off. Jack’s guest line-up include a renowned spiritualist, a renowned debunker of spiritualists (and other charlatans), and a parapsychologist working to cure the young survivor of a mass suicide by a Satanic death cult. The screen widens and the brown-heavy palette of color shifts to black and white during the commercial breaks, as the action shifts to the backstage element. What starts out playful slips further and further into paranoia, then fear, then body horror. The slide is leisurely paced, as master TV presenter Jack Delroy attempts to keep his awkward guests in line, as well as the developing presence of supreme evil.

Late Night With the Devil touches on many elements with considerable assurance. Delroy’s association with a mysterious society “the Grove” lays the groundwork for a late film reveal (do not worry: you won’t guess this). The psychologist and Satanic cult survivor are obvious nods to Pazder and Smith, authors of “Michelle Remembers” and catalysts of the “Satanic Panic” of the ’80s (Ingrid Torelli as the girl deserves special mention for bringing something new to the well-worn “creepy child” trope). The ill-fated spiritualist, Christou, is a perfect amalgam of the various foreign “mystics” prevalent at the time. And the debunker, Carmichael Hunt, carries a hubris worthy of late magician-era , but with a tenth of the charm. And that’s only the quality performances in front of the studio camera.

The question as to whether this is Apocrypha-worthy is a matter I’ve contemplated for some days now. I am unsure. When I consider the consistent quality and feel of Late Night With the Devil, I am completely taken in: its realistic aura impressing me still, despite my knowledge of the artifice—which suggests quality filmmaking, not necessarily “weird” filmmaking. Mind you, my enthusiasm has been on the mark often enough; the triple-climax finale, with the stakes ratcheted up each time, is an impressive gamble that pays off handsomely. And no, I’m not worried that I’m giving away too much. I feel certain that you, too, will get lost in Jack Delroy’s battle for Good Ratings—and his battle against the Evil One.

WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:

“This isn’t the scariest movie, but neither is it entirely a self-conscious joke. The Cairnes maintain an astute balance between pop-culture irony, familiar if not always predictable thrills (including some creature/gore FX), and a kind of hallucinatory mass-media surrealism — one that recalls the title of a 1970s cautionary tome about TV, ‘The Plug-In Drug.'”–Dennis Harvey, Variety (festival screening)

 

Capsules, It Came from the Reader-Suggested Queue

IT CAME FROM THE READER-SUGGESTED QUEUE: VAKVAGANY (2002)

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DIRECTED BY: Benjamin Meade, Andras Suranyi

FEATURING: Erno Locsei, Stan Brakhage, James Ellroy, Roy Menninger, Etuska Locsei

PLOT: Filmmakers discover a batch of home movies shot by a Hungarian family in the years following World War II; they set out to find surviving members of the family, while calling upon a group of expert viewers to help them interpret the footage.

Still from Vakvagany (2002)

COMMENTS: For as long as there have been movies, there have been professionals who seek to deliver a story to a wider audience, and there have been amateurs who only wish to record personal moments for later reminiscence. When it comes to the latter, the idea that anyone beyond a very small circle might see the footage borders on absurd. To reach a mass audience, the film would have to present something of enormous significance, like the scene captured by Abraham Zapruder in Dallas in November 1963. Or perhaps it could be used to comment on current events, such as to understand the accused subjects of Capturing the Friedmans. But beyond that, a home movie seems of little public value outside of the home, and to watch one uninvited feels nosy at best and invasive at worst.

The directors of Vakvagany seem to feel they’ve backed into a Rear Window scenario. Someone has found some old home movies, they’ve watched them, and they’ve seen some surprising things: a couple sorting through a treasure trove of jewelry and other valuables. Unusually lengthy shots of a nude infant. Footage of a mother holding her toddler son’s penis as he attempts to urinate. “What’s going on here?” they must have asked themselves. “Is this immoral? Criminal, even?” Their snooping has led them to a possibly unsavory place, and now they feel compelled to know more.

In these discovered films, we meet the Locsei family, and the first facts we receive are unsettling. Mr. Locsei was evidently a functionary in the postwar Hungarian government. A neighbor suggests he may have overseen the collection of valuables from Jews who were deported to concentration camps during the war, which may explain that delighted sorting of valuables we witnessed. (On the other hand, it will be suggested later in the film that Mr. Locsei was actually saving these possessions to be returned to their owners.) We also see his wife cavorting with grapes, which matches with suggestions of alcoholism. Most importantly, we see the two Locsei children, who don’t relish being on camera, hardly surprising given some of the awkward moments to which they’ve been subjected. 

To help us out, the filmmakers have enlisted onscreen interpreters, who are shockingly confident in their impromptu reactions. Legendary experimentalist Brakhage, upon seeing a father embracing his squirming daughter, opines, “I don’t quite believe his hugs,” and later compares the son’s efforts to free his arm from his father’s grasp to a Nazi salute. (“Perhaps I’m reading too much into it,” he then admits.) Psychiatrist Menninger wryly notes the professional Continue reading IT CAME FROM THE READER-SUGGESTED QUEUE: VAKVAGANY (2002) →

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CAPSULE: MURDER DEATH KOREATOWN (2020)

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DIRECTED BY: None listed

FEATURING: None listed

PLOT: An unemployed man becomes obsessed with a murder that happened in a nearby apartment complex, but his investigation turns paranoid as he imagines a wide-ranging conspiracy.

Still from Murder Death Koreatown (2020)

COMMENTS: Though taking its starting cue from a real-life murder, Murder Death Koreatown is, it’s safe to say, fictional, as you will doubtlessly decide for yourself by the time its deranged protagonist starts spouting theories about the Pastors, ghosts, and voices speaking to him from the sewers. It’s like a re-edited version of one of those paranoid YouTube videos that leave you wondering whether the uploader is genuinely crazy or is just stringing you along for the lulz, or like Under the Silver Lake remade on a $100 budget in the style of The Blair Witch Project.

Our unemployed, over-stressed narrator begins by following (real-looking) blood splatters on his sidewalk, and then discovering that one of his neighbors murdered her husband in a neighboring apartment complex in L.A.’s Koreatown. He discovers some minor inconsistencies, and interviews some (real-looking) locals to see if they noticed anything unusual. As his investigation continues, he starts uncovering connections which aren’t really connections—and which sometimes don’t even rise to the level of coincidences—but which are completely obvious and convincing to the protagonist. We ought to be suspicious when we focuses the camera on the blinds in his apartment and marvels, “look at this weird light…” (we have no idea what he’s talking about, but it’s a hint that he takes significance from stuff we wouldn’t even notice). Also, unless you’re Dale Cooper, it’s never a good idea to admit evidence from your dreams into a murder investigation. It’s not really a spoiler to suggest that the movie is a believable study of one man’s descent into delusional paranoia.

Your enjoyment of Murder Death Koreatown will be linked to your tolerance for watching feature-length shot-on-cellphone vlogs. The movie is, by necessity, talky—there are no significant effects or action sequences. Unfortunately, the narrator’s voice isn’t compelling: he delivers most of his lines in a drab “woe is me” tone, and at one point his bleats of terror make him sound like a Muppet startled by a spider. On the plus side, the actor they found to play the shifty-eyed homeless vet in the alley is so convincing that you might believe he’s a real hobo, and that the plot was actually built around his schizophrenic ramblings. The effective horror soundtrack is another element that supersedes the budget; in fact, it’s so well-made that it at times undermines the film’s found footage credibility. Ironically, it’s too professional a touch for a movie that’s trying to make its amateurism into a selling point.

If you’re willing to overlook the budgetary issues, however, Murder Death Koreatown is a solid watch—and if you plot it on a dollars spent to entertainment value curve, it’s off the chart. It holds our interest for just over 70 minutes and does an exceptional job of viral marketing, which is a solid double for a microbudget feature. You can read some of the movie’s promotional gimmickry at the link embedded below.

For more along these lines, Graham Jones’ Fudge 44 (2006) has a similar low-budget, mock-vérité appeal.

https://imgur.com/a/UPnp5U0

WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:

“…in mystifying its own ending, Murder Death Koreatown leaves us, like the investigator, grasping for a transcendent truth that the film itself cannot sustain.”–Anton Bitel, Projected Figures (contemporaneous)

 

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CAPSULE: VHYES (2019)

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DIRECTED BY: Jack Henry Robbins

FEATURING: Mason McNulty, Christian Drerup, Jake Head, Rahm Braslaw

PLOT: We see the results when 12-year-old Ralph tapes late night 1987 cable television shows, and his own adolescent antics, over his parent’s old wedding tape.

Still from VHYes (2019)

COMMENTS: VHYes had me at the moment when, after brushing in some happy snowcaps for the mountains she’s been crafting, the somnolently friendly Bob Ross-style PBS painting instructor announces “now, let’s get back to the spaceship.” She’s just one of the demented characters you meet as young Ralph experiments in preserving his short-attention span channel surfing for posterity: a kindly cowboy full of inappropriate advice; a couple of shopping channel salesfolk who banter passive-aggressively; an “Antiques Roadshow”-inspired host who appraises some unusual artifacts; the shy hostess of a punk rock public access show (and her supportive parents); and a prescient cultural philosopher who describes the phenomenon of “tape narcissism” and warns that “one day the world will exist only to be filmed.” Naturally, there are also a slew of vintage commercial and infomercial parodies. This smorgasbord of ersatz crapola plays like a found footage 1980s version of The Groove Tube, except that it periodically returns to check in the adventures on Ralph, his best friend Josh, and his mom and dad. Some bits are silly and overdone (there’s more splattered blood than you’d normally see in an alarm company commercial); others are subtle and absurd. The big finale is reminiscent of the kind of short that might play on “” post-midnight: Ralph finds himself surreally transported into a jumbled reality where the layers of the tape all bleed together.

VHYes is a breezy compendium of skewed nostalgia, sometimes hilarious, sometimes weird, and, unexpectedly, sometimes touching. The most substantial complaint to raise against it, in fact, is that it’s too short. There must have been plenty of unused tape, and I would have loved to see even more backstory on young Ralph. His scenes are more than just the gimmick that explains the existence of the artifact we’re watching; his story of coping with childhood fears and disappointments offer a meaningful counterbalance to the goofy comedy sketches, like the commercial for an ointment that grants cubicle workers “freakish flexibility.” On the other hand, maybe it’s best to consider VHYes‘ zippy 70-minute runtime an asset rather than a liability. It’s a “little” film, but in the best sense: short, punchy, homemade, thoughtful in its unassuming way, and—like the ongoing saga of Hot Winter, an ecologically-aware 80s porno with the lesbian orgies edited out—innocent at its heart.

VHYes was shot entirely on vintage VHS and Betacam cameras. The bits with the spooky painter (starring Kerry Kenney, of “Reno 911” fame) are spliced in from Robbins’ 2017 Sundance short “Painting with Joan”; the edited porno scenes from “Hot Winter” were also a standalone short. Director Jack Henry Robbins is the son of and , who executive produced and have eye-blink cameos.

WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:

“…a strange yet sweet film that is one-part coming-of-age dramedy, one-part found-footage comedy, and one part channel surfing.”–Kristy Puchko, Pajiba (festival screening)