If it Bleeds, it Leads

Rating: 10/10 (18 January 2015)

Reviewed by: Dare Devil Kid (DDK)
Rating: 5/5 stars
"Nightcrawler" is a great film on Los Angeles, a great film on the media, a great semi-noir, and a darn good thriller, powered by a supremely creepy performance from Jake Gyllenhaal in what is perhaps the best work of his eclectic career. But fundamentally, it's also a film about the power of showmanship, and the danger of believing your own hype.
Ambition is supposed to be a good thing, especially in this country. Pulling yourself up from your bootstraps, building something out of nothing, making a name for yourself — it's all part of the American dream. In the assured hands of Dan Gilroy, a longtime screenwriter ("The Fall," "The Bourne Legacy") making his directing debut, that dream becomes a chilling nightmare. (Gilroy's brother, Tony, the director of "Michael Clayton" and "The Bourne Legacy", serves as producer here while Dan's twin, John Gilroy, is the editor.)
Gyllenhaal's character, Lou Bloom, enjoys great financial success and dominance at the top of his chosen field, working as a freelance videographer who sells exclusive (and usually graphic) footage to an L.A. television station. Crashes and crime scenes are his bread and butter. He is driven. He is innovative. He is happy. He is also a monster — a fiend who preys on people at their weakest and worst moments. What's fascinating about Gilroy's approach to the character is that he doesn't judge him. He lets Lou do his thing and lets us gawk at the awesome lengths to which he'll go without an ounce of remorse or shame. You've got to hand it to Lou: He's really good at his job. Veering wildly between satire, psychological thrills, and moral drama, "Nightcrawler" attacks the seediness of contemporary TV journalism like network on steroids. Filmmaker Gilroy, makes every cinematic second count. If you blink you miss a tell-tale reaction shot, a vital visual plot clue, or a brilliant cut-in. For a first- time director, Gilroy demonstrates an uncommon assurance, not only in his audacious tonal shifts but in the stellar work he elicits from his cast and crew.
The most attention-grabbing contribution comes from Jake Gyllenhaal. Now 33 years old, Gyllenhaal is the same age that De Niro was in Taxi Driver and, like him, he is learning to channel an eerie, inner charisma, offering it up in glimpses and glimmers rather than all at once. If one were to somehow merge the Scorsese-directed Robert De Niro characters Travis Bickle (of "Taxi Driver") and Rupert Pupkin (of "The King of Comedy"), the result, I imagine, would be someone very much like Lou Bloom. From Bickle, he would inherit the nocturnal restlessness and vehicular inclination; from Pupkin, the delusional self-regard and entrepreneurial ambition; and from both, the sense that behind those eyes, some strange, and perhaps dangerous, thoughts are beginning to percolate. Never one to shy away from the darkness of a character's soul, Gyllenhaal, is absolutely in his element. He anchors "Nightcrawler" with a gonzo, transformative performance. Long since, it has just been Christian Bale, who's been regarded as the dastardly endearing baddie, and true successor of De Niro and Nicholson-esque roles. Well, now, he finally has worthy company.
You have to begin with the eyes. They've always been Gyllenhaal's most distinctive feature, but in "Nightcrawler" they're like parabolic antennae, wide and unblinking, attuned to any signal, however faint. As Bloom perfects his trade, he also perfects the art of improvisation, moving from observer to director of his grisly tableaux. Would the shot look better if the accident victim were repositioned more cleanly in the headlights' glare? If the murderous home invaders are not caught tonight, perhaps they can supply some additional footage tomorrow? Gyllenhaal also lost between 20 and 30 pounds for the movie—another echo of Bale and young De Niro—in an effort to physically substantiate the animal that he and director Gilroy say inspired Bloom's character: the coyote, feral native of LA, creeping down from the hills after dark. The effect is most visible in his face, in the sunken pools of his eye sockets and the rigidity of his jawline when he grins. Everything about him says "hungry". Gilroy's script is less interested in social commentary than in crafting a slippery character study, and Gyllenhaal is perfectly suited to that. Creepy, nasty, and at times darkly hilarious, "Nightcrawler" shows Gyllenhaal exactly where he seems to want to be, and having the time of his life while he's at it.
Although far from subtle, the metaphor of man as corporation in "Nightcrawler" is skillfully hidden behind black comedy, intense scenes, tense suspense, and artful cinematography. It's a slinky black cat of a movie, commanding attention and reeling you in to follow down filthy, dangerous alleys. As much a character study as its a thriller, the film will get under your skin with its profile of a go-getter whose ambition and amorality know no bounds. "Nightcrawler" is a modern- noir portrait of the way we eat our news, but amid the media, it slowly turns its unblinking eye on something darker, and much closer to home. It presents a creepy world of urban blight with rawness as mesmerizing as it's threatening.
Dark, funny, unsettling, restless, visually sleek, and powered by a lithe star performance from Jake Gyllenhaal, "Nightcrawler" offers dark, thought-provoking thrills. It's indisputably one of the best thrillers ever made and offers a devil of a performance from its lead star.