NIGHTCRAWLER Review

Ladies and gentleman, Jake Gyllenhaal has more than arrived and he is here to stay. The actor, who first entered our field of vision at the age of nineteen in October Sky has been doing solid work for years now with only a few misguided aspirations derailing what is just now beginning to shape a truly credible reputation. While Bubble Boy and The Day After Tomorrow stick out as truly awful and something of a guilty pleasure, the diamonds in the rough that are Jarhead, Brokeback Mountain and Zodiac give us more proof than necessary that we are messing with a force to be reckoned with. After making one more misstep with the understandable but overly calculated Prince of Persia Gyllenhaal turned his career around and hasn't looked back. Taking roles based purely on how much they interest him and what he could possibly do with the character rather than for any bigger reasons having to do with career direction or popularity (he dropped out of the guaranteed holiday musical hit, Into the Woods, for this film) Gyllenhaal has made Source Code, End of Watch, Prisoners and Enemy. Each of these films vary in genre and personality from both an acting perspective and what they bring to the table as far as entertainment value is concerned, but in Nightcrawler Gyllenhaal takes everything a little further, he amps everything up a notch higher and delivers a performance that makes every other performance seem like a prelude to this master class of ambition and insanity. Going through the actors filmography will allow you the realization that despite the fact we recognize Gyllenhaal as a reliable face, an old friend and an actor that typically delivers the goods-it is this film and this performance that will make him stand above the rest as exceptional. Gyllenhaal is clearly not just a one-off in the department of stirring performances with the nervous ticks and loner act that his Prisoners character clung to so strongly. Instead, he is an actor that knows how to disappear into a role by understanding not only the motivations that drive a character, but the importance of the art that composes them literally and figuratively. As Louis Bloom, a man with drive and passion to spare, Gyllenhaal is a beast of unforgiving endeavors that see him go from a driven young man to a man driven purely by the need to feel he belongs. Nightcrawler is a shocker of a ride, but in the scenes that make it all work it is Gyllenhaal doing the heavy lifting.

THOR: THE DARK WORLD Review

In episode two of the Marvel adventures this year we are given the extended look at what was easily the riskiest piece of completing The Avengers. Thor is by and large a fantasy character with a fair amount of fun to offer and fortunately director Kenneth Branagh was able to elicit those shining qualities the first time around to assemble a Thor film that while not necessarily overly impressive offered a fine enough preliminary set-up for the Norse God that was able to find just the right tone to make him credible rather than the goofy, over-indulgent mess it could have easily turned into. I credited much of the success of things being done the best way they could on 2011's Thor to director Branagh and a cast that was more than capable of delivering lines about bifrösts and frost giants with Shakespearean prestige. All of this is still in tact in the much grander, more expensive and thankfully more ambitious sequel, but Branagh has been replaced by Game of Thrones-helmer Alan Taylor and there is a new threat in the world that will of course make cause for our titular hero to jump back into action. While I am completely enthralled with seeing films overlap and build on one another we have now reached a point in our culture where we are taking in these films with such rapid consumption that we don't give them the individual focus they sometimes deserve. We are excited to see Iron Man or Thor back on screen again, but more than that we are looking forward to what will come next that the current film might hint at. I touched on this briefly in my Ender's Game review, but it is all the more relevant in the Marvel universe. The reason this has become a problem is that while these are still trying to be individual stories there isn't enough of a connection from film to film besides short mentions or familiar character pop-ups here and there. That and the fact these films aren't willing to commit to any tragedy they allow the audience to assume has occurred. Director Taylor and his film are not to blame for this issue as Thor: The Dark World is a more than worthy sequel and is generally a lot of fun to watch, but it also doesn't do much more than add evidence to the pile that Marvel is content with quantity over quality.

First Trailer for THOR: THE DARK WORLD

Thor was always the one Marvel character I was concerned with prior to the release of his first solo film. I enjoy Kenneth Branagh and his work, but the trailers for the first film were somewhat nerve-inducing as it looked as if it could teeter on the edge of cheesy and fall in very easily. Thankfully, it turned out to be a rather solid film and one that, while underwhelming in some aspects, delivered on what it needed to do. Director Alan Taylor (Game of Thrones) has taken over for this sequel though and its clear that darker tone of his former work has seeped into the realm of Asgard. I was happy to hear that this next step in the Thor story would take place more in space and while the trailer doesn't give much of an indication as to how much that will be it certainly lets us in on the aspects of the story that deal with Jane Foster (Natalie Portman) and a possible love triangle between her, Thor (Chris Hemsworth), and Sif (Jamie Alexander). With barely a glimpse of main antagonist Malekith (Christopher Eccleston) where he provides a possible way for Portman to Channing Tatum her way out of this sequel via G.I. Joe. I hope this isn't the case as I'd like for there to be more than just Gwyneth Paltrow's Pepper Potts as the lone better half of The Avengers. Still, there are several other shots of Portman on Asgard that could come at any point in the film though it feels like this trailer is completely taken from the first twenty or so minutes of the movie given a few action scenes. In mentioning the action, it looks phenomenal here with a few epic set pieces to be sure and a different style to it that looks to be more intriguing and more along the lines with the personal style of the titular character. We also get a nice glimpse of Loki (Tom Hiddleston) near the end which is made all the more intriguing by how he might play into this story. Thor: The Dark World also stars Stellan Skarsgård, Idris Elba, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Kat Dennings, Ray Stevenson, Zachary Levi, Tadanobu Asano, Rene Russo, and Anthony Hopkins and opens in 3D on November 8th. Hit the jump to check out the trailer.