David Fincher’s Zodiac

By: DThompson | in: Movies |

There’s been talk of David Fincher’s new movie, Zodiac being too long. It is long, not exceptionally so, but pushing three hours. However, the movie divides itself rather neatly into two parts. The first section detailing Zodiac’s murders and their subsequent investigation in the late ‘60’s and early ‘70’s. The second part describing the toll the case takes on the lives of everyone involved, including the Zodiac himself. So, if you think of it as two 80 minute movies instead of one at two hours and forty minutes, it doesn’t seem so bad.

Zodiac

Zodiac starts out with innocuous sixties music and fireworks over the San Francisco bay and it becomes immediately apparent that aside from making a thriller and a police procedural director Fincher is taking the opportunity to make a period film. Se7en it’s not. The style is dark and moody, yet entirely realistic and it is this realism that gives the film its charge. The inescapable weight of history hangs over the characters like a blade. None of them are able to break free. Innocents will be killed and our heroes, both reporters and police will never truly catch the bad guy. Fincher segues easily from the foggily bucolic beginning to the first of three bluntly unpleasant murder scenes made all the more shocking because you know they’re coming. After we are made to stand mute witness to Zodiac’s coldly brutal act the movie splits into seperate paths as the Zodiac’s first letter and hero Jake Gyllenhaal both travel to the San Francisco Chronicle. Gyllenhaal plays an unusual variant of the ordinary crusading protagonist who just can’t let a case go as Robert Graysmith was in real life the cartoonist for the paper.

Zodiac

We’re also introduced toAnthony Edwards and Mark Ruffalo playing the cops on the case and Robert Downey Jr. as a dissolutely drunk and drugged up crime reporter, which must’ve been a real stretch. Zodiac himself remains in the shadows and is actually played by three seperate actors which renders him appropriately unknowable. The film is never less than gripping as murder scenes break into the narrative without warning. You find yourself shaking your head and whispering warnings as characters head towards their unknown and inescapable fates.

As the case drags on you see how the actions of the Zodiac begin to destroy the lives of everyone associated. By the second half of the film this victimization is readily apparent as no further murders occurr yet character after character drops from the story. Gyllehaal is eventually left alone pursuing the Zodiac at the risk of his job, then his family and finally his very life.

Zodiac

Though the case was never solved there was a favorite suspect, one with a mountain of circumstancial evidence against him. Arthur Leigh Allen died of a heart attack as law enforcement was readying to move against him. I was in Sacramento in the early 80’s and recall seeing this man on the evening news hotly denying that he was the Zodiac. The reporter went on to say Allen had just died of a heart attack. The man I saw on the news was haggard, clearly at death’s door. In the end, if Arthur Allen was the Zodiac killer, he was his own final victim.

Fincher has done an excellent job creating a film that evokes an era, tells a gripping story and provides plenty of twists and thrills. By focusing on the lives of those surrounding Zodiac and not on Zodiac himself he creates a human drama of how inhuman actions radiate out to affect us all.

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Posted on March 15, 2007

Comments

7 Responses to “David Fincher’s Zodiac”

Emon on March 15th, 2007 9:08 am

Good review, D! Can’t wait to check it out. Do you have a ‘Can’t wait to watch it’ list for spring or summer?

HMTKSteve on March 15th, 2007 9:24 am

Great review.

Any time a film maker can take a story from recent history (where you already know the ending) and still keep you on the edge of your seat it’s a good thing!

I’ll throw this on my Netflix que once it hits DVD.

DThompson on March 15th, 2007 12:00 pm

Thanks Emon, HMTKSteve,
It’s a very good movie and well worth seeing in theaters or on DVD.
Well Emon, that’s an interesting question. My Spring list seemed long for a bit bur know that Zodiac and 300 are behind me it’s seems short!
Grindhouse is out mid-April, Tarantino & Rodriquez, I’d go if the movie was called “Reciting The Phone Book”!
There’s also a Philip Dick inspired movie called “Next” that shows promise but I still have to pay to see my movies so it may have to wait.
In May, of course “Spiderman 3″, but one movie I was looking forward to and now think I’ll avoid is “28 Weeks Later” as Danny Boyle had naught to do with it. Not even a producer’s credit! It’ll take a really boss trailer to get me to see that one now. How disappointing.
Also in May William Friedkin has a new horror movie out called “Bug” and that looks pretty cool.
In June there’s the new Fantastic Four movie “Rise Of The Silver Surfer” which, a few months ago I would’ve bet my last dollar I was going to avoid at all costs but have you seen the trailer? MAN!
Finally in June, “The Simpson’s Movie” I am READY for this one! Doh! Ay Caramba! Excellent!

DThompson on March 15th, 2007 12:01 pm

sorry for the 10,000 typos.
…and The Simpsons is out in July. Doh!
D

Charbarred on March 15th, 2007 12:15 pm

I’m with you on the Tarantino movie. I’d go even if it were an educational film about the dangers of eating lettuce.
Are they actually releasing 28 Million Dollars Later? I figured it’d go direct to DVD.

Rustycat on March 15th, 2007 1:03 pm

Thanks for the movie list D, Grindhouse is sure to rock. Bug looks nice, guess I’ll check it out as well.
Dying to see Zodiac.

Anita on March 15th, 2007 3:31 pm

The 2nd part of the movie sounds great … maybe I’ll go with some friends and play video games during the first half, then come in for the second half (I just can’t sit through a 3 hour movie, even if it’s great).