Imagine you’re at the scene of a fiery car accident at night to shoot video for a local news station. You’ve arrived before emergency services – and ahead of your competition – giving you carte blanche to shoot whatever you want. The only other people there are the man possibly responsible for the wreck and the dead body lying in the shadows of an overturned vehicle.
As you begin to capture footage, you realize the shadows are obscuring the victim. Do you: a) leave the body where it is so the police can figure out what happened – and possibly exonerate the survivor; or b) move the body into the headlights of one of the vehicles so you can get a better shot?
If you answered “b,” then you must be Louis Bloom, and you’re not just a morally reprehensible human being, you’re a great reason to see “Nightcrawler,” a new movie starring the amazing Jake Gyllenhall as you.
“Nightcrawler” is first and foremost a funny but also scathing indictment of local television news. Louis spends his nights listening to a police scanner and trying to be the first videographer to reach each scene. Once there, he shoves his camera into the faces of the victims and the emergency responders, concerned only with getting the footage that will get him paid and on TV. Never mind if he gets in the way.
Never mind real news, too. Louis develops a creepy co-dependent relationship with Nina, the early morning news director at a struggling Los Angeles television station. As played by Rene Russo, Nina has a knack for reshaping facts to make a story more sensational. When she receives important information about a triple murder Louis caught on camera, she says, “Give it to the noon crew. I want people talking about our video.”
“If it bleeds, it leads,” one of Louis’s competitors tells him. This sends Louis down a slippery slope to taking bigger and bigger chances, and eventually to breaking the law to get footage even more shocking than his last. This places viewers under indictment as well. Are we interested in the truth? Or are we consumers of lies? Does our appetite for murder and mayhem shape the world around us? Do we create the Louises and the Ninas?
“Nightcrawler” writer and director Dan Gilroy asks these questions without providing answers, which led to my surprise when “Nightcrawler” ended. The film is invigorating, but at the same time, I felt empty as the credits rolled. I wanted someone to pay, and I wanted answers. Perhaps Gilroy is saying we’ve gone so far as a society, there’s no going back.
Still, “Nightcrawler” is great fun. Gyllenhall has been preparing for the role of Louis his entire career. At first, Louis seems to be just another unemployed loser (when we meet him, he’s cutting through a chain-link fence so he can resell it), but he’s actually brilliant and motivated, and has an uncanny ability to dissect facts and see patterns within them. However, these qualities come with an off-putting quirkiness. Gyllenhall plays Louis just south of crazy, his face frozen in a slightly maniacal expression. As I watched, I didn’t see the actor, but the character he brought to life, and I loathed every greasy inch of him.
I especially like the dialogue Gilroy wrote for Louis, much of which sounds like regurgitated self help and motivational text. Clearly, Louis is a product of a greedy, self-centered society. It’s almost as through Gilroy dares us to judge him, given that we created him.
“Nightcrawler” is more than a compelling character study; it’s also a gripping thriller. As Louis takes greater and greater risks, and begins to manipulate events to get the footage he wants, the action becomes more and more intense. The climactic sequence – a car chase filmed on the streets of L.A. – is thrilling.
If there’s a movie heaven, “Nightcrawler” will be a shoo-in. Its virtues are many, while its only sin is forgivable. Although it’s not a film for the mass market, I hope it finds the success it deserves.
Three-and-a-half stars out of four. Rated R for violence, graphic images, and language.
David Laprad is the assistant editor of the Hamilton County Herald and an award-winning columnist and photographer. While working for another newspaper, he took a picture of a mother grieving at the scene of a car accident in which her daughter had been seriously injured, proving even a mild-mannered features writer can have a bit of Louis in him. Contact him at dlaprad@hamiltoncountyherald.com.