Night of the Demons (2009)

We continue our October Halloween lineup with 2009’s remake/reimagining of Night of the Demons, comparing it to the campy 1988 original we still have a soft spot for.

We talk about what made the first film iconic—Angela’s weird energy, the dance, the poster art, and practical effects—and why this version feels like a bigger-budget copy-and-paste with less charm. We break down the New Orleans setting, the party vibe, the confusing character/space staging, and the juvenile “push the envelope” moments, plus the underused cast (including Shannon Elizabeth and Edward Furlong).

From the basement skeleton reveal to the safe-room exposition dump and chaotic finale, we cover why it’s not terrible—just a bit forgettable and disappointing compared to the original.

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Night of the Demons (2009)

Ep 511, 2 Guys and a Chainsaw Horror Movie Review Podcast

Todd: Hello and welcome to another episode of Two Guys and a Chainsaw. I’m Todd.

Craig: And I’m Craig.

Todd: All right, we are week four, approaching Halloween here with our, uh, October fest of Halloween-themed movies, and I’m really liking our selection this year so far. It’s hard to believe 2009 was, uh, 15 years ago.

Craig: I know.

Todd: Oh, my God. But, uh, here we are. 17 years ago, actually, wasn’t it?

Yeah.

But it’s a remake. This is Night of the Demons, not to be confused with the ’80s version of Night of the Demons that, uh, you and I did many moons ago. Mm. This is the 2009- Reimagining, remake, whatever you wanna call it, directed by Adam Gierasch. It was remake of the ’88 film by Richard Tenney, which we’ve done, and, uh, I held a special place in my heart.

I remember the original movie, and we- I think we talked about this when we did it, had a really, really freaky poster of, uh, Angela transformed into a demon that-

Craig: Oh, yeah …

Todd: that was up in, like, every video store. I- it feels like they must have just given those away by the scores. And, and then I remember watching the film as a kid, really enjoying it.

And then when we went back to see it as adults, we’re like, “Oh, man, this is, this is cringey, bad material,” but it was so bad it was fun.

Craig: I was gonna say, I don’t remember. I vague- like, I, I vaguely remember liking it or, or at least finding it charming in some way.

Todd: Oh, yeah. Very, very charming in the way that a so-bad-it’s-good movie is really charming.

But yeah, no, dude, it was like the acting is horrible, the writing is, is hilarious with just absolute corniness. If I remember correctly, that was the one where Linnea Quigley bends over.

Craig: Yeah.

Todd: Uh, she’s in, like, a tutu, and she’s shopping, and you get that long shot of her, of her crotch.

Craig: Yeah, and that’s super early.

It’s like, it’s just a couple of minutes into the movie. So you know what you’re getting into right away. Yeah, I do. I remember that.

Todd: It’s silly. It’s a silly movie, but it’s fun.

Craig: I don’t know. M- maybe it’s just in light of having watched this movie. I, I think maybe I’m looking back at the original with rose-colored glasses a little bit.

I guess I should have either re-watched it or listened to that. God, I, I have no idea how long it’s been since I’ve heard that, that episode that we did on it. I, I just remembered feeling… You know, I, I, I remember specific things that I rem- that I liked about it. I, I really liked Angela’s dance. I thought, you know, that’s kind of iconic, and you see it all over the place.

Todd: Right.

Craig: I did like, like, the demon design. Like you said, like, Angela’s face is really scary. It looks great on the poster. It’s, I don’t know, uh, it’s got, uh, kind of a playfulness about it, almost like a- It does … like a- Big time … like a, a Deadite kind of vibe to it, and that like-

Todd: Mm-hmm.

Craig: And, and I like that in demons.

I like that when demons kind of revel and have fun and they’re evil. Like

Todd: Right.

Craig: I think, I think that’s cute. So I like that about it. I, I remember I, I loved the super, super cheap-looking opening sequence, like the credit- Yes … sequence, like the really cheap- The cartoon … animation.

Todd: Yeah.

Craig: Yeah. And it was very Halloween-y and ghosts and black cats and-

Todd: Great song.

Craig: Yeah, so all these, you know, little things that I remember about it. I, I imagine that if I were to rewatch it again in its entirety, I could pick it apart a lot more. But I had those fond vibes of it. The reason I picked this one, we’ve kinda been going back and forth. We, we laid out a, a, a Halloween lineup pretty early this year, but we each picked our own choices, and this was one of mine And I think that I picked it because lately to go to sleep I’ve just been putting on pretty much any horror movie on Tubi, and then one of the things that I like about Tubi is that they just, you know, I, I, I’m sure you can change the settings, but my settings are when one movie gets over, it just rolls right on over to the next one.

Todd: Ah, yeah.

Craig: And it’s like, “If you liked this one, you’ll probably like this.” And one night I woke up in the middle of the night and this movie was on. And I don’t remember what part of it was, but I- it was v- I, I think it was early on in the, the party scenes, which obviously we’ll talk about in a second. But at 3:00 in the morning, right out of sleep, I remember thinking, “Oh, this is fun.

It’s got a great Halloween vibe.” You know, it’s a, a remake of a, a movie that we look at fondly. It’s got, you know, it’s a really interesting time in horror where they’re doing a lot of remakes, and you have the sexy, squeaky teen focus. And like, you know, Shannon Elizabeth is in here right out of the American Pie series, and she was in Scary Movie also, and I like her and she’s hot, and it looks like it’s got a bunch of other hot chicks in it and-

Todd: Right.

Craig: I thought, “This, this, this will be great. It’ll be fun.” And, and I had seen it before. The, what I remembered about it was that it was bad but fun.

Todd: Uh-huh.

Craig: And now I think that I was right on one of those counts.

Todd: I,

Craig: I

Todd: think,

Craig: um- So my, my, my memory was half right.

Todd: Yeah. Not, not nearly as fun as the original.

Craig: It’s not great, but it’s interesting. Like, if you’re a fan of the original, I think it can almost be fun to watch to be like, “How did you mess this up?”

Todd: Right. Like, you had, you had so much to play with here. Like, you, you know- Yeah … the or- like I said, the original was pretty much anything Richard Tenney did.

God bless him. We love, like, Witchboard and all those. Th- they’re fun. W- g- Witchboard and Witchtrap especially, they’re fun, but the acting is horrendous.

Yeah.

But in that fun way that, you know, we like to see bad acting in our low-budget, low-rent horror movies. The dialogue is ridiculous. You remember there was that, the bigger guy in there who was the jerk who just called every woman a bitch every time he turned around?

And then that weird-ass scene with Linnea Quigley and her lipstick in the nipple that-

Craig: Yeah, I liked that.

Todd: Just comes out of left field. I know, right? Just comes out of left field like, why? Where did this co- okay, I guess this is what’s happening now. Just a lot of stuff thrown at the wall, and pretty simple premise, pretty simple plot.

There’s a lot of directions you could’ve taken this, and this is what we got, is a little disappointing.

Craig: Yeah, it’s… And that’s the, the best way I think to describe it. It’s a little disappointing. Like, it’s not terrible. There’s just nothing inspired about it. Like, it, it’s not inspired at all. Yeah. It, it just kind of feels like…

Ironically, it feels like a cheap copy and paste, which I, I say it’s ironic because this movie had …