“A screaming woman running down the street with her throat
cut.” That’s the image Nina (Rene Russo) evokes when describing her news
program in director Dan Gilroy’s tremendous thriller Nightcrawler.
It’s tempting to adopt that as a metaphor for the entire film—Gilroy’s first,
by the way, which makes his achievement doubly impressive—but while that is
definitely part of the equation, what drives this movie forward is the menace
that lurks just below the surface, beneath a calm exterior personified by Jake
Gyllenhaal’s Louis Bloom.
A nocturnal rambler who scrounges for anything he can steal
and sell, bolted down or not, Lou is a motivated self-starter. Full of
meaningful acronyms, manufactured self-confidence, and drive powered by
self-improvement seminars, catchphrase wisdom and insight, he’s looking for a
career to break into on the ground floor. When he comes across the lucrative
world of nightcrawlers, freelance stringers who race after breaking news
stories—the bloodier, the better is the prevailing wisdom—he has the ambition,
opportunity and, most importantly, the moral flexibility to excel.
Gyllenhaal, who shed in excess of 30 pounds for the role,
has rarely—if ever—been better. Lou is calm, frank, goal oriented and even
borders on charming at times, but this measured exterior belies the inherent
violence you spend the entire movie waiting to see erupt. He has a hungry,
animal energy—he’s often visually equated to a coyote—like a sociopathic used
car salesman who isn’t afraid to use manipulation to secure a sale. And failing
that, you’ve no doubt that ripping out the jugular is a viable option.
With his lax concerns about ethics, journalistic or
otherwise, Lou traffics in human misery, never afraid to step across a given
line, both metaphorical and police issued. And because of this, his footage is
ratings gold, which leads to a symbiotic relationship with the vampiric Nina,
who runs the night shift news at the lowest-rated network in town. Russo is
also at the top of her game here; ruthless and desperate, she thinks she’s
found a rube in Lou, only to be terribly surprised. As he continues down his
dark path, pushing further beyond the boundaries and into extremism, she’s
right there with him.
Nightcrawler circles around a bit before
finding a rhythm and getting to the real meat, and is almost procedural in the
way Lou gets into the trade. But once the momentum picks up, it doesn’t stop.
As Lou grows more unhinged in his quest for the perfect shot—he doesn’t
hesitate to move what may be a corpse, or a seriously injured man, at an
accident scene for better composition—the film becomes a scathing indictment of
an industry that favors ratings above all else, including information.
There’s a sharp, equally vicious class divide that cuts
through the nightcrawler craft—wealthier neighborhoods and whiter skin
translates to more eyes on the screen. You don’t learn anything specific about
Lou’s background, but much is hinted at through Gyllenhaal’s controlled fury.
He’s lonely, broke and broken. With his continual self-education—everything he
says could be a quote from a flavor-of-the-week, how-to-succeed-in-business
book—he has the air of a prisoner with a lot of spare time on his hands to
read. He’s manufacturing his own up-by-your-bootstraps, rags-to-riches tale,
augmented at times by James Newton Howard’s score, and is the hero of a
narrative of his own divining.
While Gyllenhaal and Russo take center stage, they’re
propped up by a few nice supporting performances. Riz Ahmed as Rick, Lou’s
navigator, sidekick and second camera, is dimwitted and beleaguered, not sure
he signed up to be part of an enterprise his boss runs like a Fortune 500
company, all for $30 a night. Bill Paxton also appears as a slimy veteran
nightcrawler, bringing a layer of smarm and sleaze like only Paxton can.
From the very first shots, which paint Los Angeles as
idyllic and peaceful—a façade that doesn’t last long— Robert Elswit’s
cinematography may be the unsung hero of Nightcrawler. Paul
Thomas Anderson’s go-to guy, Elswit gives you a cold distance, much like Lou
films the graphic scenes of human lives lying in ruins. He watches his camera,
never seeing the scattered bodies as anything more than objects, and that’s how
Elswit shoots. You focus on Lou; everything else hovers hazily in the
background, inconsequential. Elswit has also lensed big action blockbusters
like Mission: Impossible—Ghost Protocol and Salt
(he was also the DP on The Bourne Legacy, which Gilroy
wrote), so the many high-speed moments in cars are presented with a dynamic
visual flair, striking a solid balance.
Balance is key to Nightcrawler. Lou, and
the movie as a whole, walk a tightrope with little room for error. A moment too
late and Lou has nothing, whereas a misstep could send the film plummeting into
absurdity, farce, or worse yet, unbelievability. But Gilroy’s script and
Gyllenhaal’s ravenous performance keep it reined in, and tightly. Nightcrawler
is tense and intense, ferocious and obsessed, and crackles with energy and a
dark sense of humor.
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