If You Liked These 5 Movies, You'll Probably Love Nightcrawler

Ryan Gosling is a stuntman/mechanic by day and a getaway car driver by night in the moody and brutally violent Drive. There are shades of his character in Lou, mostly evidenced by their shared lack of social interaction and real knack for their chosen careers. Of course, they also both drive at night doing sketchy things.

Aside from the Los Angeles setting, Training Day and Nightcrawler have quite a bit in common. One amoral male as a mentor? Check. One inexperienced guy going along for the ride? Check. A crime-riddled story that spins wildly out of control? Check. Exposure to how messed-up institutions we trust — like the police or the TV news — can be behind the scenes? Check.

If Nightcrawler's creepy trailer left you grinning, you have to check out David Lynch's L.A.-set masterpiece, Mulholland Drive. While it's far more tonally bizarre, it uses the normally glossy city to show how it can foster fears and horrors. Plus, at times Lou Bloom feels like a character written by Lynch.

Do you like your Jake Gyllenhaal dark and morally questionable? Chances are, you enjoyed Prisoners, and you'll like Nightcrawler just as much. Lou is definitely crazier than Gyllenhaal's character in Prisoners, but they both have extreme looks and aren't people you'd be pleased to meet in a dark alley. Both films are gritty and disturbing and likely to make you more anxious as they go on.

Collateral and Nightcrawler both take place in Los Angeles, mostly at night. Though the former is about a contract killer (Tom Cruise) and the cab driver (Jamie Foxx) he takes hostage to drive him around and the latter is about a journalist, both deal with bloody crimes. If you were on the edge of your seat watching Cruise's dangerously imbalanced character interact with his cabbie in Collateral, you'll be just as tense when Lou starts manipulating his copilot, played by Riz Ahmed.