Jake is beyond creepy here

Rating: 9/10 (26 November 2014)

The most suspenseful film of the year to date. It was mesmerizing to watch writer/director Dan Gilroy's shocking portrayal of a psychopath calmly doing the very dangerous and criminal things that exited him no end but would leave a normal person senseless and useless. The story and format of the film has been discussed so I will concentrate on the very engrossing way the story told about Louis Bloom(Jake Gyllenhaal) and the very scary way he lived his new-found dream(nighcrawling TV sensationalist "news")and why he was so successful at it when we are all told that psychopathy is a severe mental disease with no cure and no hope of a normal life. In this film story it was so well shown to be the opposite in this story, as the psychopath Louis Bloom not only did well, he prospered greatly by living his crazy but carefully calculated life without the personal care, caution and integrity that most of of us try to live by. Nothing mattered to him but his work, and big success from it, as all people were mere pawns used for his game, even if it killed them. His all-engrossing intensity during "the chase" and accompanying car chase of each story was mesmerizing to watch. You will not forget Louis easily after seeing this film. Nightmares may result. Watch your neighbor carefully.
The denouement suspense was without equal, the car chases were wonderfully shot in nighttime L.A., especially the last one that ended in tragedy(but not to Louis, of course, he loved it). And, the final, nearly sexual climax conversational interplay between Louis and the TV station news director, so well played by Rene Russo, gave us real insight into the distorted emotions and greed that drives these deranged types to want to show such gruesomely graphic and sensationalist stories as the lead-in stories for their "newscasts". Winning at any cost, of course, was their only goal. Nothing else mattered, certainly not truth, facts, obeying the law, or even human decency.
The film was hard to watch at times, and it will leave you creeped out at the end but also entirely satisfied that you just saw a great and original film story with great acting. Don't miss it.