Late Night – Review

Late Night

Directed by: Nisha Ganatra

Runtime: 102 minutes

I went into Late Night without knowing anything about its premise; the only thing clueing me into its contents was the painfully vague poster that decorated the invitation to the screening. As a reviewer, I have a lot of these types of films come through my inbox, and I honestly just expected this film to be a middle-of-the-road workplace comedy. While the presence of Emma Thompson raised my interest, I didn’t hope for much more than a cheap The Devil Wears Prada knockoff. Thankfully, I was left pleasantly surprised by what the film had in store for me.

Following a fading late-night host and her writing staff, Late Night strives to be a little bit more than a workplace comedy. Most of the charm of this film rests in its nuanced characters. Thompson’s Katherine Newberry could have been relegated to cold-hard-bitch territory, but brings a lot more nuance to her portrayal of a comedienne who became too comfortable in her own excellence. Mindy Kaling is charming enough, and the supporting characters are all a little more than your typical tropes. But really, this is Thompson’s film, and it benefits from focussing on her characters’ struggles.

Lately, it has become clear that a lot of female characters are written to be empowering first, and people second. We are in the age of the strong female character™, and while this is great in building role models for little girls, there is an untapped potential residing in interesting, flawed, and powerful women who can make mistakes, learn, and… essentially, be human beings. Katherine Newberry is strong-willed, yet suffers from depression; intelligent, yet pig-headed; independent, yet in need of help. I enjoyed getting to know her, mostly because of Thompson’s portrayal, but also because she was written in a three dimensional space.

However, the film isn’t perfect. Sometimes the formula of the film means that particular issues have the illusion of nuance, but no room for adequate depth. The ‘antagonists’ of the film are not particularly fleshed out, but the run-time doesn’t allow much more development in that regard. The ending of the film is also quite predictable, but that is expected with a film like this. Really, this is an average film elevated by its cast and characters into something much more enjoyable. Should you watch it? Like with anything, it depends if you’re interested… but if you are, you could do a lot worse than this.