#RSS Feed for Film Reviews articles - Telegraph.co.uk [p?c1=2&c2=6035736&cv=2.0&cj=1] Accessibility links * Skip to article * Skip to navigation [telegraph_print_190.gif] Telegraph.co.uk ___________________ Submit Search - enhanced by OpenText Sunday 17 January 2016 * Home * Video * News * World * Sport * Finance * Comment * Culture * Travel * Life * Women * Fashion * Luxury * Tech * Cars * Film * TV * Film * TV and Radio * Books * Music * Comedy * Art * Theatre * Photography * Dance * Opera * Hay Festival * Glyndebourne Advertisement 1. Home» 2. Culture» 3. Film» 4. Film Reviews Nightcrawler, review: 'jet-black laughs' Nightcrawler, starring Jake Gyllenhaal, is an electrically overblown satire on tabloid journalism, says Tim Robey 3 3 out of 5 stars Jake Gyllenhaal in Nightcrawler Jake Gyllenhaal in Nightcrawler By Tim Robey 12:25PM GMT 30 Oct 2014 Follow Comments Comments Dir: Dan Gilroy. Starring: Jake Gyllenhaal, Rene Russo, Riz Ahmed, Bill Paxton. 15; 117 min. Try to imagine the acrid TV satire of Network, lit up by the sodium glare of an LA crime flick from the 1980s, and you’re some of the way into Nightcrawler. The film’s a satirical thriller, which is a novel enough entity in itself these days; it has a pungent, can’t-miss-the-point premise, and a big, weird, sharkish performance from Jake Gyllenhaal powering it up. It’s a must-see and a must-talk-about film, electrically overblown in the moment, if not wholly in control of its pay-off. Gyllenhaal’s Lou Bloom starts the film as a guttersnipe in the City of Angels, prowling the night for scrap metal, desperate for a job, or even work experience. “I’m not hiring a thief”, says one of his customary buyers, at whom Lou fires off a wide, alarmingly insincere grin. Chancing on a bloody traffic accident that night, where he notices a professional film crew grabbing what footage they can, Lou sniffs a career opportunity: he swipes an expensive mountain bike, and trades it in for a police scanner and a digital video camera. Such are his baby-steps into the harsh, grubby and morally dubious world of freelance crime journalism. Related Articles * Mr Turner: 'Spall is like a moulting, phlegmy Gruffalo' 31 Oct 2014 * Interstellar: 'close to a masterpiece' 27 Oct 2014 * The best films in cinemas now 24 Apr 2015 “Think of our newscast as a screaming woman, running down the street with her throat cut,” the no-bullshit Nina (Rene Russo) advises Lou, after he’s sold her his first, shaky but intense footage of a carjacking casualty. She’s the news producer working the so-called ‘vampire shift’ on a bottom-rung LA TV station, hungry for sensation, and especially keen on “well-off victims, injured at the hands of the poor or a minority.” Lou is to this gruesome manor born. He recruits an assistant called Rick (Riz Ahmed) off the street, where he’d otherwise be turning tricks, and promises long-term employment, on the condition he’ll accept a $30-per-night pittance to start with. Rick says yes: every Volpone needs a Mosca, after all. The pair crawl the kerbs through the witching hour, waiting to pounce on yet-to-break stories, ideally before any of their better-equipped rivals, such as the boorishly gloating Chris (Bill Paxton), can get to the scene. The complete moral indifference of tabloid journalism is not news, and to the credit of writer-director Dan Gilroy (brother of Michael Clayton’s Tony), he’s not pretending it is. His script’s ripely over-the-top, mining vulture culture for jet-black laughs. Gyllenhaal’s Lou is a mantra-spouting creep, who forces Russo to accept a date with him if she wants access to his increasingly no-holds-barred material, and then explains his masterplan to “implement expansion”. He’s the worst possible by-product of the American dream, raised on a vocabulary of pure business-speak, and lacking in a single human quality except cunning, drive and oneupmanship. He’s no Travis Bickle. Like Rupert Pupkin, the humourless wannabe De Niro played in The King of Comedy, he’s even worse. Gyllenhaal seizes on the role with fervour, eliciting an appalled admiration as Lou steps up his tactics. He’s robustly supported both by Russo (Gilroy’s real-life wife), in her meatiest role since The Thomas Crown Affair, and by the equally good Ahmed, cast nicely outside the box in the closest thing to a sympathetic part. They can only gawp at Lou’s chutzpah, when he thinks nothing of illegally manipulating crime scenes, or following hot on the heels of serial-killing home invaders before the police have even got there. The curious thing is how implicated we are in his grisly, self-aggrandising quest. It’s a weird feeling wanting such a callous nobody to thrive. If he didn’t, the film would stop dead – it’s rigged up and running wholly on his adrenalin. It also shouts what it has to say, like a crazed circus ringmaster infectiously fond of his own routine Start your free 30 day Amazon Prime trial» [prime-article-pane_3216676a.jpg] Film Reviews * Culture » * Tim Robey » * Culture Reviews » * Film » * Film news » In Film Reviews Zulu (1964). Directed by Cy Endfield and starring Stanley Baker, Jack Hawkins and Michael Caine. The best movies to watch Box office hits in 2014 Birdman (Or the Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) Michael Keaton: 'Who are you calling a washed-up superhero?' 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