NIGHTCRAWLER

Sitting somewhere in the ether between "Network" and "Taxi Driver", and the equal of either, is Dan Gilroy's terrific "Nightcrawler". The blackest of black comedies and a pulsating thriller, this is the kind of movie that will become legendary just as Jake Gyllenhaal's career-defining performance will become legendary. He's Lou Bloom, (yes, if you want to you can read into Lou's travels through night-time LA something akin to Mr Joyce's Leopold Bloom's journey through Dublin's 'Nighttown', but only if you want to), and Lou's vocation in life is to film the dead and the dying, particularly the victims of violent crime, and share his work with the world on television. Of course, he's an obvious sociopath but he's probably psychopathic as well which makes Gilroy's film very scary as well as very exciting. As a character he's up there with Travis Bickle and, as has already been suggested, Rupert Pumpkin whose delusions of a kind of grandeur, (he keeps spouting the same kind of aphorisms), are both funny and very frightening. Gyllenhaal is never off the screen and should be a front runner in next year's Oscars. In fact, this would have been a one-man show were it not for the brilliant supporting turns of Rene Russo as the TV station's voracious news editor, (she makes Faye Dunaway's Diana Christiansen look like a pussycat), and Riz Ahmed as Lou's greedy and none too bright assistant. I did say that this was the blackest of black comedies and I did chuckle a lot, almost in disbelief, knowing all the time that Gilroy has put nothing on screen that isn't already out there in the public domain. "Nightcrawler" isn't telling us anything new; there are no limits anymore and everything is up for grabs but if there is nothing new under the sun then at least we should be grateful we're getting it as full on as this. I loved every delirious, scary, funny minute of this amazing movie.