‘Nightcrawler’ and ‘Inherent Vice’

What’s most alarmed me while I was watching “Nightcrawler,” Dan Gilroy’s startlingly urgent, relevant neo-noir tinged with satirical commentary about media exploitation, was not the actions of Jake Gyllenhaal’s sleazy, sociopathic criminal-turned-crime journalist, Louis Bloom, but rather my own acceptance of his warped rags-to-riches story, made all the more believable by Gyllenhaal’s chilling performance and the way the film so candidly reflects on-screen the darkest tendencies of human behavior.

Louis Bloom is as repugnant, slimy and frightening a character as you will see in the movies, a man who has nothing to lose and, to the world’s chagrin, everything to gain through his uninhibited approach to whatever he is doing, whether it be beating a security guard unconscious for his watch, or stealing construction materials to peddle for a profit. When he sees something he wants, he gets it.

The most unsettling thing about Bloom is that he is both filled with ambition, and ethically and morally bankrupt, so when he by chance crosses paths late one night with a freelance film crew, led by cameraman Joe Loder (Bill Paxton), who is covering a crime to sell the footage to the highest bidding broadcast news organization, Bloom becomes obsessed with filming crimes and car crashes. The film then delves into exploring how strangely and madly compatible Bloom’s unstable personality is with this line of work, as he starts up his own freelance business as a “nightcrawler,” prowling the streets and monitoring police scanners for crimes to cover. He sells his footage to a morning news show at a local TV station, led by news director Nina Romina (Rene Russo, never better), whose life becomes entangled with Blooms for better at first, and then later for worse.

“Nightcrawler” is a cleverly restrained film that feels utterly of the moment. The final act builds layer upon layer of suspense and dread, until it hits a shattering climax you won’t soon forget. Then it draws back a bit, and plays it safer than expected. Yet “Nightcrawler” manages to maintain its integrity and its effect long after it ends. At first you won’t believe what Bloom does, or how his superiors allow it, and then egg him on with fervor. And then you will realize, like I did, that you do believe, and that will strike you the hardest and sit with you the longest.

★★★1/2 (out of four)

Until now, I have loved almost all of filmmaker Paul Thomas Anderson’s work. I re-visit each of his first five films at least once or twice a year. “Hard Eight,” “Boogie Nights,” “Magnolia,” “Punch Drunk Love,” “There Will Be Blood.” What a quintet. His sixth film, “The Master,” which was an exploration of the spread of religious groups such as scientology in the 1950s, that took the form of a character study of two men, one based loosely on Church of Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard (played magnificently by the late Phillip Seymour Hoffman), and another a returning war veteran (played by Joaquin Phoenix), did something none of Anderson’s previous film managed to do: It left me cold. Still, there were things to admire and I still recommended “The Master” based on the strong performances and the gorgeous photography (both Anderson staples at this point.)

All of this to say, as much as it saddens me, I cannot recommend Anderson’s seventh film, “inherent Vice.” Here’s why:

Anderson adapted “Inherent Vice”  from a novel by polarizing author Thomas Pynchon. In the movie, which is set in 1970, pothead private investigator Doc Sportello (Joaquin Phoenix, channeling subtle comic brilliance from time to time) becomes entangled in a plot involving kidnapping, drug trafficking, corruption, and Doc’s ex-girlfriend, Shasta Fay (Katherine Waterston, excellent). It would be a waste of time trying to hash out the specifics of the plot, as they never make sense or come together in any kind of coherent way.

There are some terrific performances here, as by the above mentioned Phoenix and Waterston, and also by Benicio Del Toro as Doc’s attorney, Josh Brolin as a detective who dislikes Doc but loves eating frozen bananas, and Martin Short as a raucous dentist with a cocaine addiction.  Unfortunately, good performances cannot save the staggeringly ineffective screenplay that rarely succeeds as an adaptation from page to screen. There are a lot of conversations in rooms that feel completely disconnected from everything else, and that ramble on to the point where when it ends, you can’t remember what the scene was about when it started. It all plays as too direct an adaptation, as if we are watching the reading of a novel. Film is a visual medium, and had the golden rule been applied to “Inherent Vice” in the screenwriting stage, the final product may have had a better flow. The golden rule? A book is a book; a movie is a movie. Somewhere early on, that concept was lost.

As pretty and well-acted as Anderson’s attempt at a ‘70s crime-noir comedy is, there is a tangible pettiness to the film that drags it down. It’s an aloof, disjointed mess that feels both disappointing and terminally uninspired. It also doesn’t help that echoes of Joel and Ethan Coen’s “The Big Lebowski,” an equally silly, yet infinitely funnier and more engaging film that dabbled in comedy-noir, live all throughout “Inherent Vice’s” seemingly endless 150-minute running time. Let’s hope this is just an experimental speed bump, and that Anderson will get back on track after this.

★★ (out of four)