Nightcrawler (Night Call) **** Jake Gyllenhaal deserves an Oscar nomination for his powerful performance here as a determined psychopath whose main drive is ambition and achievement. He portrays a serious young man who wants to find a job, learn a trade, more than eager and willing to do anything to get ahead. He stumbles onto the job of crime reporter for a Los Angeles TV station. As he grows in his field, his appetite increases for more success, more control.
Scriptwriter and first-time director Dan Gilroy has created here a heart-pounding thriller and a psychological study of a man who loses all notion of right and wrong in his quest for fame in the murky field of crime journalism. It is both sick and quite brilliant.
(Photo – Ascot Elite)
Dark Star *** (vo German) HR Giger became world famous through his work on the monsters he created for Ridley Scott’s original Alien film, and for the Oscar he won for them. But he was a huge talent before and after, living and creating in Zurich, with a multitude of fans, his intimate friends and his many women, who remained true to him till his death this past spring.
His private life and his fascinating art – full of darkness and sexuality – are the focus of this excellent documentary by Belinda Sallin. She takes us into Giger’s strange world, immersing us in an existence of incredible talent, labour and excess. This is unmissable for true art aficionados.
(Photo – Frenetic)
Neptune Ravar Ingwersen reviews film extensively for publications in Germany and Switzerland. She views 4 to 8 films a week and her aim is to sort the wheat from the chaff for readers.
