Lou Bloom knows how to trade.  He’s the main character in Dan Gilroy’s Nightcrawler.  He’s played by Jake Gyllenhaal, maybe the performance of the year, and Nightcrawler is easily the best film of the year.

It’s all there in the first ten minutes.  The electric urban L.A. landscape, the unease of Bloom’s company, his performance where there should be a personality, his ruthless eye for a ‘trade’, the learning and watching, the tension.  All that in the messy acquisition of a watch.

This is the best film of the year because it strikes a perfect tone and commits to it.  It launches a character and runs with him without going down the obvious, easy and well-trodden paths.

This is a film with real pulse.

Highly Recommended.