Hi, I’m Michael.
This is Lessons from the Screenplay.
In Nightcrawler, Jake Gyllenhaal plays a character named Lou Bloom, who stumbles upon the world
of local tv news.
He becomes a stringer — someone who films breaking stories, often tragic and violent,
and sells the footage to TV stations.
Lou is motivated, clever, and a sociopath.
“What if my problem wasn’t that I don’t understand people but that I don’t like them."
Throughout the film, Lou’s lack of empathy and drive to succeed leads him to takes increasingly
unforgivable actions.
Yet he remains the hero of the story, while we, the audience, stay engaged.
Why?
How necessary is it to have a “likable” protagonist?
And what do antiheroes offer that conventional heroes may not?
Let’s step further into the world of Nightcrawler.
Sympathetic Characters
Usually when you hear the phrase "sympathetic character" it's referring to how likable the character is.
We tend to like characters who have traits that we find admirable…
But the idea that a protagonist must be nice or morally flawless to be sympathetic is a misconception.
Some of the greatest protagonists in film and TV history have been rude people with
questionable morals…
But they still have other traits that can make them sympathetic to a certain extent.
Let’s look at a couple ways screenwriter Dan Gilroy creates sympathy for Lou.
First of all, Lou is a very hard worker.
“My motto is, ‘If you want to win the lottery, you have to make the money to buy
the ticket.’”
This is demonstrated in the sequences where Lou is first learning how to be a nightcrawler.
He does whatever it takes to succeed, and quickly becomes very good at what he does.
Both traits that tend to be impressive and respectable.
“Oh that’s a great piece of tape!”
Being a hard worker is an example of a sympathetic character trait that is separate from morality.
Lou has another trait that is more traditionally associated with likability.
“I’m just beginning so praise from someone such as yourself, well you can imagine that
it means quite a lot.”
Lou is polite.
“The ad didn’t say what the job was.”
“It’s a fine opportunity for some lucky someone.”
But we quickly see that there is something off about his politeness.
“You heard I’m adding a second van?”
“I didn’t hear that.”
“Gonna be a game changer.”
When he starts threatening people in the same calm, polite manner, it becomes a chilling
reminder of his sociopathic nature.
“I feel like grabbing you buy your ears right now, and screaming in your face, ‘I’m
not fucking interested.’”
This emphasizes a potential problem with trying to create "likable" protagonists.
As Robert McKee says in "Story":
“Likability is no guarantee of audience involvement; it’s merely an aspect of characterization.”
Being polite is an external behavior, and does not equate to an internal "goodness."
And it's that deeper character that the audience ultimately connects with.
When trying to create a sympathetic character
it’s easy to end up with a one-dimensional collection of moral, nice, boring character
traits instead of an actual character.
As Nightcrawler progresses, any sympathy we may have had for Lou in the beginning fades.
He takes increasingly extreme actions until it’s clear that he’s dangerous and should
be stopped.
But if we, the audience, don’t want Lou to succeed, why do we keep watching besides
morbid curiosity?
Why do we remain invested in the story and engaged with Lou as protagonist?
This brings us to empathy.
Again, Robert McKee:
“The audience’s emotional involvement is held by the glue of empathy."
So what exactly is empathy, and how do you create it for your characters?
The definition of empathy is "the ability to understand and share the feelings of another."
And the key to creating it for your characters is within it's definition.
"Understand."
We empathize with a character when we understand the motives behind their actions.
When despite disagreeing with a choice, we know why it was made.
Let's look at how we gain empathy for Lou.
When we meet Lou, he's trespassing, stealing, and attacking a security guard.
But in the following scene we get a sense of Lou’s situation, where he’s coming from.
“I’m looking for a job.”
“In fact, I’ve made up my mind to find a career that I can learn and grow into.”
“Who am I?
I’m a hard-worker, I set high goals, and I’ve been told that I’m persistent.”
“So what do you say?
I could start tomorrow or even why not tonight?”
“No.”
We see that Lou is in need of money, that he’s a little strange, and that he’s searching
for fulfillment.
As Lou says in his first line of the script:
“I’m lost.”
Knowing all this about his situation, we understand why he’s so excited to find the world of nightcrawling.
“Television news might just be something I love as well as something I happen to be good at."
We empathize with how it must feel to find a well-paying job that you’re good at and
also find fulfilling.
That’s something we can all relate to.
As the story goes on, the forces of antagonism apply more and more pressure to Lou, so he
responds by taking more and more extreme action.
At one point, Lou is late to a great story, so his rival gets the exclusive.
“Five fatals!
"Come screaming out of the fucking sky!"
"All lit up with the brush on fire."
"Mine, exclusive!”
We understand the embarrassment that comes from being beaten.
“Welcome to the future, brah!”
Because his rival got the exclusive, Lou has nothing of value to bring to his boss, Nina.
“Is this it?”
“No, I have a stabbing in Corona.”
“I don’t give a god-damn about fucking Corona!”
Nina explains this is unacceptable
And makes it very clear that he has to deliver something spectacular.
“I want you to get int he god-damn game.
"I want something people can’t turn away from."
"I want what you fucking promised me!”
We understand the shame that comes from disappointing a respected authority figure.
Now he’s under a huge amount of pressure and he knows his opponent has the upper hand.
We understand his frustration.
So when Lou decides to sabotage his competitor’s van, causing a crash that threatens his life,
we know why Lou is doing what he’s doing.
We don’t necessarily approve, but we’re still involved in the story.
Nightcrawler has a crystal-clear cause-and-effect that keeps us engaged with Lou, and allows
us to empathize with each situation he's in.
So now that we've seen a few techniques that keep an audience involved in an antihero protagonist,
I want to briefly examine the virtue of doing so.
In the case of Nightcrawler, having Lou be our protagonist forces us into
looking at our world in a different way.
The movie itself doesn’t pass judgment on Lou.
As writer/director Dan Gilroy says…
“I always saw this as a success story.”
“I see it as the story of a young man who is desperate for work at the beginning of
the film and at the end is the owner of a thriving business.”
After all, Lou didn’t create this world of nightcrawling.
Of TV news built for sensationalist entertainment instead of sensible education.
He just stumbled onto it and is doing what he's told.
“We find our viewers are more interested in urban crime creeping into the suburbs.”
“What that means is a victim or victims, preferably well-off and white, injured at
the hands of the poor, or a minority.”
The fact that Lou’s sociopathic nature let's him excel in this world only serves to further
highlight the real problem.
“The real problem isn’t Lou—and this is again going back to the empathy for the character—
I believe the real problem is the society that creates a character like this and rewards
a character like this.”
Because we empathize with Lou and understand why he does what he does, it allows us to
partially displace moral judgment.
To realize that Lou is simply fulfilling the supply that we, society, are demanding.
This is the power of storytelling.
When we empathize with someone we wouldn’t normally—someone we may not even deem likable—
And look at the world through their eyes, we have a fantastic opportunity
to learn about ourselves.
Hey guys!
Thanks to everyone that suggested I look at Nightcrawler.
It was one of my favorite movies of 2014.
Every time I watch it I'm blown away by Jake Gyllenhaal's amazing performance.
It's just so good.
Thank you also to "The Q&A with Jeff Goldsmith" for letting me use some of their audio.
It's a great podcast where he interviews screenwriters—I highly recommend it.
The link is in the description below.
If you want more videos be sure to subscribe.
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And if you have a suggestion for a screenplay that I look at in the future, leave it in the comments below!
And finally, and most importantly, thank you for watching!
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