AMERICAN PSYCHO

NIGHTCRAWLER Direction: Dan Gilroy Actors: Jake Gyllenhaal, Rene Russo Rating:

He is intelligent and jobless. It’s also apparent that the protagonist is a psychopath. Making a living from petty theft, he chances upon a way to rake in the big bucks. He finds employment as a freelance videographer. Now a ‘nightcrawler’, he (Gyllenhaal) barges onto crime and accident scenes and sells the footage to a TV news channel.

During his forays into the underbelly of Los Angeles he records car crashes and murders without any regard for the law. Desperate to achieve success he indulges in the worst excesses of yellow journalism and tampers with evidence which could possibly endanger the lives of his competitor (Bill Paxton) and his underpaid assistant (Riz Ahmed). Director Dan Gilroy displays expert command over the medium.

The City of Angels is photographed with breathtaking virtuosity by Robert Elswit. A sonorous music score by James Newton Howard adds to the film’s impact.

In a career-defining role for which he reportedly lost a lot of weight, Jake Gyllenhaal is astonishing. Simply put, Nightcrawler is unmissable.