Review of Nightcrawler (2014) by Lowbrowcinema — 03 Nov 2014

Not the masterwork it wants to be but huge credit for trying and almost getting there. The film suffers from an uneven voice and bad pacing which all could have been corrected by an expert editor. NIGHTCRAWLER needs an objective eye to whip it into shape. But enough of the negative. So much is so good and the film is full of surprises from the performances to its depiction of LA. Incidentally, about 90% of this film is shot like 50 feet from our house. I can only think of one other film that captured the "real" LA so closely and that is THE MORNING AFTER. This is the real LA. Not the reel LA. I don't want to give it away but I so appreciate that the sleaze factor is kept in check and actually feels like the real world rather than an over amped sizzle reel. Jake Gyllenhaal is very good but doesn't totally or intrinsically inhabit his character. He's a guy that's weird and scary but not so scary that you'd run away from him which is good but you see Gyllenhaal's wheels turning which is not so good.

But then there is the revelation... Rene Russo. She is masterful and every way and it is her scenes with Gyllenhaal that anchor the film and show what could have been. Further, these scenes are the ones which are so surprising they're almost shocking in their matter of factness.