NIGHTCRAWLER Is the Pitch-Black Satire We Need

NIGHTCRAWLER Review:

- The fact that NIGHTCRAWLER was the #1 movie at the American box-office over Halloween weekend is, surely, one of those strange anomalies that will often be mentioned as an exception-to-the-rule - the rule being that smart, weird, adult-oriented, non-franchise films can still do well. Nightcrawler's success may ultimately prove modest in the grand scheme of things, but, this is a film that very much deserves to be seen by a wide audience. It's a film that reminds me of some of the great movies about who-we-are, one part Taxi Driver, one part Network. Jake Gyllenhaal stars - in a soon-to-be-iconic role as weirdo loner Lou Bloom - and he absolutely kills it. He delivers a haunting, strange, funny, and downright disturbing performance as an ambitious outcast whose moral compass is severely off-kilter. This is a film that really shocked me with just how dark and lurid it was willing to go. It pushes its plot to jaw-dropping extremes, and is all the more memorable for it. This is a can't-miss film that, in my mind, ranks right up there among the year's best.

NIGHTCRAWLER introduces us to Lou Boom and instantly makes him into a fascinating, idiosyncratic, and deeply disturbing protagonist. We see him trying to sell pilfered scrap metal, and then desperately, creepily try to convince the scrapyard owner he's selling to to hire him. "If you want to win the lottery, you gotta have the money to buy a ticket." argues Lou. Later, Lou comes across a bloody car wreck, and becomes intrigued by all of the opportunistic video jockeys swarming the crash scene, grabbing video footage in hopes of selling it to local news networks. Lou sees this as a way to make money, as something he'd be good at. So he buys himself a video camera, recruits a down-on-his-luck assistant named Rick, and is off to the races. Lou finds he has an aptitude for monitoring police bands and getting the sort of shock-TV footage that the local news channels crave. He becomes a regular supplier of footage to a local news show run by Nina (Rene Russo). "If it bleeds, it leads" is her mantra.

What's so interesting about NIGHTCRAWLER - and what makes it such a potent satire - is the way in which Nina and her team are repelled and repulsed by Lou, yet also serve as his enablers. As someone who's now lived in Los Angeles for close to ten years, I've seen how uniquely-obsessed LA local news is with sensational stories - the more violent the better. Good luck trying to stay up to date on local politics via LA TV news broadcasts. But if you want to see car chases, car crashes, and gruesome scenes of domestic violence, LA's news teams have got you covered. Of course, local TV news isn't exactly a prime source for news for many people these days, so you might think that NIGHTCRAWLER's premise is potentially outdated. In reality though, NIGHTCRAWLER functions brilliantly as not just a satire of local news' morally-bankrupt bloodlust, but also of any number of institutions that build empires off the blood of others. Lou Bloom represents the nightmare version of The American Dream - an ambitious self-starter who rolls up his sleeves, starts his own business, and ends up becoming a successful entrepreneur. But he does all of this all while his moral compass - shaky to begin with - increasingly shatters. It makes you think: how many businesses, how many institutions, how many empires, were built on blood?

Lou Bloom goes from merely quirky and creepy to downright scary, as he increasingly shows himself willing to do anything and everything to get the footage he wants. As the film progresses, he reveals himself to be a flat-out sociopath. And to its credit, NIGHTCRAWLER doesn't pull punches. This is an extreme film willing to go to very dark, very messed-up places in order to tell its story and make its point. During the film's climactic sequence, in which we see the full extent of Lou's depravity, I've got to say that I was in shock at what I was seeing. The film's intensity will leave you breathless.

Give credit to writer/director Dan Gilroy. The guy's been around for a while as a writer, but this is his first directorial effort. And what an effort it is. Gilroy makes NIGHTCRAWLER a definitive Los Angeles film. He films Gyllenhaal as Lou Bloom all around the greater LA area, and he vividly paints Los Angeles at night as a dark place full of secrets and violence and ominous danger. This is not the glamorous side of LA, but the seedy, shady side of the city that residents see often, but that Hollywood often ignores. This is the sort of LA that gives birth to bottom-feeders like Lou Bloom - parasitic people who dwell in the shadows and roam the streets in search of blood. Gilroy infuses his film with creeping-dread atmosphere and a pitch-black sense of humor. He also crafts some truly riveting action, including an edge-of-your-seat car chase that is among the most nail-biting I've seen in a movie this year. The sense of tension in some of this film's scenes is off-the-chain.

So much of what makes NIGHTCRAWLER as memorable as it is can be attributed to Jake Gyllenhaal's performance as Lou Bloom. Gyllenhaal's breakout role came from Donnie Darko, in which he showed that he could ably play the oddball outsider. The actor has since dabbled with playing more traditional leading-man characters, but he's always excelled at playing eccentrics. And here is his most eccentric character yet - one which Gyllenhaal makes into a funny-scary mash-up that is utterly distinct and totally mesmerizing. Bloom speaks in a measured, hyper-literal manner that might seem completely comical in other hands, but Gyllenhaal tempers the character's quirkiness with a real darkness and edge. He goes all-in, and so you buy this character despite his over-the-topness. This is Oscar-worthy stuff from Gyllenhaal.

Rene Russo is also absolutely great as TV news producer Nina Romina. Russo makes Nina nearly as compelling of a character as Lou - she's a veteran producer who knows what she wants and tends to get it. But she and Lou are two sides of a coin: Lou's weirdness and depravity is sort of out there in the open - he tries to mask it, but it's there. Nina's depravity is of the slicker, more corporate, more institutionalized variety. It's the kind that's a seemingly acceptable part of corporate America. And yet a key part of her job is making deals with devils like Lou Bloom. As their relationship becomes stranger and more personal, we see the intertwining of the two roles. Is Nina really all that different from Lou? Is she not just Lou with a better job title, more money, and more professional tact? In any case, Russo does a bang-up job of making Nina a fascinating foil and accomplice to Lou. There are a couple of other notable turns in the film. Riz Ahmed is fantastic as Rick - a street kid who gets hired by Lou to be his wingman during his nighttime escapades. Ahmed perfectly portrays Rick as just the sort of desperate-for-cash guy who might be willing to hook up with Lou - but who eventually can't help but question his employer's sanity, as the full scope of his pathology becomes evident. Rick is a character both funny and heartbreaking, and I think Ahmed deserves major attention for his breakout role here. Bill Paxton is also excellent as a rival nightcrawler (the name for the guys like Lou who crawl the city in search of lucrative accident footage for TV news).

NIGHTCRAWLER is one of those films that burrows deep into your psyche and won't get out. Rich in atmosphere and completely uncompromising, it holds a mirror up to the media - and to America - and shows its darkest side in lurid detail. This is who we are, it says, and the truth, well ... it's ugly. Lou Bloom's midnight rides through Los Angeles may just become the stuff of cinematic legend: this is must-see satire of American Dream as American Nightmare.

My Grade: A

EDGE OF TOMORROW Is This Summer's Blockbuster To Beat

EDGE OF TOMORROW Review:

- EDGE OF TOMORROW is the best blockbuster movie of the summer so far. Brilliantly-scripted, directed, and acted, it's an uber-satisfying sci-fi action thriller that takes full advantage of the possibilities inherent in its premise. Tom Cruise and Emily Blunt both bring their A-games in the lead roles. Cruise puts a new twist on his typical ultra-intense and hyper-competent action movie persona, and Blunt fully establishes herself as a real-deal badass for the ages. Meanwhile, director Doug Liman (The Bourne Identity) returns to film after an extended stay in TV, and completely knocks it out of the park. This is the best thing he's ever done, by far.

What's so cool about EDGE OF TOMORROW is that it takes its Groundhog Day-style do-over premise and melds it with the logic and experience of playing a videogame. In that way, there's a weird kinship between this film and Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, which also applied videogame logic and methodology in its storytelling.

In Edge of Tomorrow, Tom Cruise plays Cage, who begins the film as a snotty PR man working for the military, whose job is essentially to push the military's message out to the public via press conferences, talk show appearances, etc. The military needs all the good PR it can get. In this near-future earth, the planet has been invaded by a horde of conquering aliens called Mimics, whose liquid-metal bodies dart around a battlefield like out-of-control buzz-saws. The humans' new united army is not faring all that well in the battle, and they're gearing up for one last stand - an epic battle that aims to take the fight to the Mimics, all-or-nothing. One of the great heroes of the military effort is Emily Blunt's Rita, affectionately known as "The Full-Metal Bitch." Rita and the rest of the military wage war in mech-like combat suits, stomping around the battlefield adorned with all manner of mechanized heavy artillery enhancements. Cage, however, finds himself unexpectedly ordered by commanding officer General Brigham (the always-great Brendan Gleeson) to head to battle. This big last stand is an all-hands-on-deck deal, and Brigham orders Cage to fight. Cage tries to object, but when he attempts to get out of Dodge, he's forcibly taken to the central army base and inserted by his gruff supervising Sergeant (an over-the-top Bill Paxton) into a ragtag unit of misfits and losers. Soon enough, Cage is on a nightmarish battlefield, fending off Mimics, unable to even properly operate his mech suit or weapons. And then ... he dies.

However, due to a strange set of circumstances that I won't reveal here, Cruise's Cage becomes possessed of a unique ability: when he dies, he essentially travels back in time to a fixed point (in this case, it's the moment when he is first dropped off at the army base), and respawns, videogame-style. When he comes back, he maintains all of the knowledge of his previous "life," and his challenge lies in applying what he learned before dying, to ensure his survival in the next go-round. Soon though, Cage learns that it isn't only his survival on the line. His unique power allows him to use his knowledge of what's to come to warn the military about the futility of the battle ahead. And as it turns out, Rita is aware of Cage's ability, and has been manipulating events in order to fully exploit it to help win the battle against the Mimics. The stakes are high. There is a ticking clock on Cage's ability to respawn, and so he needs to do everything he can to give humans the advantage in the war's looming endgame.

All of this plot-resetting could have easily become tedious and repetitive, but it's handled so cleverly that it actually becomes thrilling. Cage's actions increasingly deviate from their original path from life to life, and seeing Cage essentially piece together the puzzle of what he has to do to change the tide of the battle is fascinating. Moreover, since Cage starts out as sort of a wimp - a pencil-pusher comfortable in front of a TV camera, but totally out of his element in a fight - seeing him gradually transition to a full-fledged badass (under the guidance of Rita) - brings with it a sort of satisfaction that we rarely see in these sorts of movies, where heroes tend to be born and not made. Cruise is excellent in the film - he's always great in these sorts of high-intensity action roles, but this one really stands out since it takes him the entirety of the film to fully become "Tom Cruise: Action Hero." At first though, he's just a guy who's in way over his head. And Cruise does that part of the role as well, if not better, than when Cage is at the height of his powers later on.

Emily Blunt flat-out kicks ass as Rita, who is one of the best female characters in an action movie in quite some time. Rita feels fully-formed - she has a clear inner life separate from her relationship with Cage, and it's her planning, smarts, and badassery that actually drives the plot's forward-momentum for much of the film. Rita is, for most of the film, the one guiding Cage's life-to-life strategy, formulating the game plan as to how he can use his ability to make a difference and course-correct. Blunt previously showed her action chops in Looper, but this is a whole new level of awesome. I actually think that, aside from the wow-factor of seeing Blunt in a high-tech combat suit wielding helicopter-blade weapons, this is some of the best acting I've ever seen from the actress. Her Rita is a fierce, driven, extremely capable soldier who is quite simply a fantastic and memorable character. If you remember one thing from Edge of Tomorrow, it will likely be Blunt as the "Full Metal Bitch."

Blunt and Cruise also work really well together. What's nice is that the film acknowledges some chemistry and builds a meaningful relationship between the two, but romance is not a central aspect of the story. These are two soldiers with big things at stake, and so the bond that builds between them happens organically, and is more complicated and nuanced than in a typical star-crossed Hollywood romance. This again contributes to the strength of Blunt's character - her partnership with Cage is a key element of the story, but the personal relationship isn't what's driving the story. Their shared determination to save the human race is the driver, and that means that the stakes are never undermined by the need for the dramatic kiss or what have you (see: Superman and Lois making time for a dramatic lip-lock as Metropolis burns around them in Man of Steel).

What's also surprising is that amid the darkness and bleakness of this futuristic, war-torn world, the movie still makes time for a lot of lighter moments, and even humor. The movie is actually really funny and witty at times. There's some great playful banter between Cage and Rita. Bill Paxton's corn-fed Sergeant Farell is consistently entertaining-as-hell and funny. And Noah Taylor's Dr. Carter, the slightly-mad scientist who teams with Cage and Rita to discover the alien adversary's weakness, is also a lot of fun. Point being, EDGE OF TOMORROW is far from the grim slog that some of the trailers made it out to be. It's actually a really fun and audience-pleasing ride that balances out its darker moments with good old-fashioned Summer Blockbuster entertainment.

To that end, Doug Liman tears the house down with his direction on this one. The movie moves along at an always-exciting, rapid-fire clip. And the big action set-pieces are some of the best of any sci-fi blockbuster in years. Again, a lot of the reason these scenes work so well is because of the way they're built up. We're not just seeing sound and fury, we're seeing action that continually shows us Cage learning from past mistakes and improving his combat abilities and survival skills. Sure, having already lived out certain moments, he gets to play god and anticipate an adversary's move before it even happens. But more than that, he is self-upgrading, acting out a real-life process of videogame-esque leveling up. And that is thrilling to watch.

The movie perfectly captures the risk/reward process of playing through and advancing through a videogame. Of learning from failures and evolving until one is truly the master of the game - fully in control of its mechanics, able to anticipate obstacles and navigate through challenges with ease. In turn, the videogame-style structure, as in Scott Pilgrim, becomes a way of looking at life. Live, die, repeat, win. Our days, our hopes, our struggles, in microcosm. EDGE OF TOMORROW tells a great story, but the underlying smarts of how that story is presented is what makes it so impressive. Even those who've never played a videogame will, I think, get caught up in the rush of "okay, what now?" logic puzzles that the film invites us to live out alongside Cage and Rita. It all feels so fresh, presented in such a novel way, that I want to say that this is the flat-out best sci-fi action film since District 9. It seems like bland marketing may have hurt this one at the box-office, but the fact is that the movie is one of the more unique and original action blockbuster films in years. Go see it - THIS is the big movie to beat this summer.

My Grade: A