Nightcrawler

An intimate thriller whose greatest asset is the perfect performance of the lead actor – we haven't had such an unreadable, dark character going on his own without firearms for a long time, and together with the dark atmosphere of nighttime, crime-ridden L.A., especially in the end, it brings the emotional experience of the story to the level of the best we could see in 2014. In the final analysis, the film feels more like a small intro into the sick soul of an obsessive careerist, and doesn't make much of an effort to link his immoral actions with the commentary on criminal justice (the ending almost feels like an ode to investigative "snooping"), but that doesn't detract from its quality. 80% (09/07/2015)

L.A. at night, full of the flashing lights of ambulances, a career built on climbing over people, the hyena-like behavior of the tabloid press and a super cool Dodge Challenger. Nightcrawler gets off to a slow start, but finishes strong. The centerpiece of the film is the excellent Jake Gyllenhaal, an actor who keeps getting better with age, just like a fine wine. (07/04/2015)

Nightcrawler was exactly what I was expecting it to be, which is basically the only complaint I can have. It was missing at least one moment of bigger surprise or shock. Basically, I thought that Gyllenhaal’s self-confident sociopath (all the good things that’ve been said about his performance are true) would go a little further in his quest for career advancement. It’s a critique of an awful era and the lack of morals, where only viewership numbers have value and ethics are pushed aside. “I will never want from you anything that I wouldn’t do myself.” Impressive, dark, captivating, but I think Lumet’s Network cuts deeper. 9/10 (20/12/2014)

Nightcrawler is the best date movie for tabloid journalists. At the same time, it is a film that uses the withering television news industry only as a basis for addressing more universal themes with bitter cynicism – the ideology of self-improvement, extreme individualism and careerism in the conditions of market capitalism (which requires giving meaningful-sounding titles not only to meaningless jobs, but even to murder, for example). It also works superbly as a mirror held up to a rotten society, thanks to the fact that Gyllenhaal’s nocturnal predator, with his “Zelig-esque” ability to blend into any environment, lacks a stable identity (it’s no coincidence that one of the film’s final shots quotes the climax of The Usual Suspects). He cold-bloodedly and remorselessly imitates others from the beginning (he is clearly unaware that such things as morals even exist). He didn’t come up with a quick way to achieve great success himself, but learned it by watching and listening (from, among other things, television and online courses). He understood that what sells best is continuously stoked-up fear and that every person and every unfortunate event can be a monetizable commodity. He simply takes what he wants, even if he has to kill for it or create the desired reality himself. I consider the brilliantly escalated development of Lou’s alteration of reality in front of the camera to be the strength of this return to the aesthetic (from which Michael Mann similarly draws) and narrative straightforwardness of the 1980s. From rearranging the photographs on the refrigerator and concealing certain facts, Lou’s path smoothly progresses to repositioning corpses and telling lies that can be lethal. For Lou, the whole of Los Angeles becomes a computer game (GPS map, completing missions within a time limit) in which anything can be done without any major consequences (for the guilty). Related to this is another timeless level of the story – the loss of one’s ability to distinguish between what is real and what is merely conveyed to us in a world lived through media (for example, Lou’s comment that the background in the television studio looks so real, his attempt to communicate with a reporter on the screen). The film itself plays with this boundary between fiction and reality when it takes on the “action” method of news photography, even in shots that are not filmed with a television camera, thus essentially letting the protagonist become the director of what we see. Apart from his inability to distinguish between what is real and what only seems to be real, however, Lou is not that different from people who live only for their careers. Because of that, Nightcrawler could continue to elicit unpleasant chills long after the television news industry has been supplanted by internet journalism. Or something even worse. 80% (02/02/2015)

It's like an episode of GTA, from which someone removed the humor and most of the perspective. Unfortunately, Jake put on his "lose weight and get an award (consolation)" costume in a full retard style and the result is a perverted Forrest Gump character. It would have been possible to sit through if Dan Gilroy had not sought to show a perversely serious image of media hyenism. A few humorous moments make it better, but it's hard to balance a number of places where Gyllenhaal adds gas deep under the floor, resulting in a grin instead of freezing. I also have a problem with the structure. The first 2/3 is largely based on trying to engulf the viewer with the neon darkness of LA, but the combination of characters beyond the edge of believability and repetitive situations is not hypnotic, but instead rather annoying. Shock and derailment somehow don't get out through the photogenically overexposed night sets. The last third gets going thanks to the plot, but I rather inadvertently found myself watching Nightcrawler with a similarly shallow interest as reality cop shows (I don't care what happens to who, just that it's simply happening), while Gilroy's material is far cooler, lots of angles, gaps, music and so on... if this film is supposed to be a seductively distorted picture, it really failed. Because in the end it seduces the viewer into dull staring rather than a deep critical reflection on the media snuff. The sexual arousal of Jake and his lady friend at the end is perhaps the falsest moment of Nightcrawler, who stalks with commitment, but he misses the essence of the composition. Hardworking? For sure. Enchanting? No chance. (31/01/2015)