Boy you ain't gonna believe this! Guess who had a hand in production? IFC and Shudder. I don't plan this man, I don't! I swear! This is as common as dirt when it comes to this show, correlation is off the charts! Moving swiftly on to the actual review, I remember seeing the trailer for this not that long ago and I gotta admit it had my attention and it never left my mind on the list of future reviews and now that I've finally seen it, it was everything I expected it to be and yet so much more I didn't see coming. There's a good sized intro really getting you in the right mindframe for this movie, setting up the decade of the 70s, who Jack Delroy is and what his talk show is like, what he went through before the Halloween taping of a spirit medium, a skeptic, and a literal possessed girl and it's really friggin' good! I'm a sucker for period pieces and that extends to history less than a century ago, the costumes, set design, and overall vibe is perfectly situated in the 70s and couple that with the TV quality of that time and you almost could pass this off to a parent or grandparent as something real. In fact the movie almost does take this urban legend lens, it even plays on the frankly horrifying concept of the Mandela Effect at one point, and while we never leave the studio and see the effects of the broadcast we don't need to. Because we are the audience. Kinda meta man! But what an absolute joy, this treat it is, to see David in a leading man role! To see him from Joker thug in The Dark Knight to this is amazing and I'm quite proud of him, as he does deliver a subdued but nevertheless nuanced performance of a man trying to get on top while dealing with a lot of dark stuff in his past. The minute I laid eyes on Ingrid Torelli as the possessed girl Lilly I knew it was gonna be a cracking good performance and she did deliver, simultaneously being this bright bouncy girl and yet simultaneously unnerving and while we don't really see a lot of the demon itself I think the movie understands the quintessential lesson of less is more. It still leaves an impact, it still works in the atmosphere of the film. Ian Bliss as skeptical Carmichael whether you believe in the supernatural or not is a good character to boo and hiss at, he's such a pompous ass who can't fathom something unnatural happening and it's wild to think we essentially have one set, and five characters to bring this 90 minute movie to life and they do nail it! The production as stated is damn good, with a nice little ode to Brian De Palma when the screen splits, and the combination of on air color footage and black & white off air footage really reminded me of Oppenheimer. This undoubtedly has a cult following and I can strongly see why, the concept alone is worth the price of admission and this whole week was just the right remedy to get me hip deep in the Halloween season. But we got more to come, 4 stars, 8/10, and as always remember the owls are not what they seem.
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