Lou Bloom (Jake Gyllenhaal) is a scumbag in search of a calling. He spends his days educating himself via the Internet and his nights stealing copper wire. After a semi-successful evening - he sells his haul but is rebuffed when he applies for a job with the very people he just sold clearly stolen goods to - he spots a flaming car by the side of the road and stops to look. He sees some cameramen filming the aftermath, and learns that they sell the footage to local news stations. Inspired, he buys a camera and a police scanner (funded by stealing a high performance mountain bike) and starts his own freelance business filming crime scenes in order to sell the footage to an L.A. station run by Nina Romina (Rene Russo). Unsurprisingly given his other work, Lou goes to extreme lengths in order to get the best footage possible.