Spoilers follow ...

Rating: 7/10 (1 December 2016)

The most horrific aspect of this film – and it is terrifying – is the fact that the main thrust of the storyline is not too far from the truth. The media, its lack of morals and sympathy for victims of crime, is attacked on no uncertain terms through the career trajectory of Louis Bloom, a small time criminal who has aspirations of success. Also included within the story's framework is how the career options of someone from 'the wrong side of town' are only pursued with the aid of superhuman cruelty and lack of regard for others.
Jake Gyllenhaal plays Bloom brilliantly, with piercingly wide-eyed intensity and a staccato delivery of lines of dialogue restricted to only the bare bones of the subject in hand, his intent and the likely outcome of his endeavours. Every conversation is presented as a last-minute business deal, like that of an eternal car salesman unable to switch off, but on a grand scale. Every intricately constructed audacity is accompanied by a wide smile, either of arrogance or warmth – either way, it is hugely disarming. Writer and Director Dan Gilroy has said that Lou exhibits all the traits of a sociopath, and is on the autism and Asperger's spectrum, although nothing is ever addressed or specified. Instead, it is deliberately left to the audience to work out reasons for his manic social behaviour.
Employing the homeless Rick (Riz Ahmed), he hacks into police radio messages to gain access to crimes the moment they have happened – the bloodier the better – and films the results. Then he presents his footage to hard-nosed mogul, Nina, with whom he very logically points out he would like to have a relationship. She finds Lou's complete lack of humanity appealing, and the footage he provides ensures they both appear to have a successful partnership, career-wise – but utilising methods so heartless, even seen-it-all-before Detective Frontieri (Michael Hyatt) is appalled. But Lou's methods are so blatant and meticulous, she cannot do anything about him – he and his activities are, as it were, hiding in plain sight.
When Nina eventually gives into Lou's 'charms', she accepts his employment opportunity and promotion almost as a sexual, spiritual thing, cementing not only his illustrious future, but hers as well, personally and (most importantly) as a business proposition. That the film ends with Lou and Nine thriving in their appalling way of providing news stories at the expense of anything approaching empathy, is telling indeed, and markedly close to the truth of such things.