Zodiac Reviews

Zodiac

David Fincher retreads the serial killer genre with his latest offering Zodiac. Following the true-life case of the killings in the San Francisco area in the late 60's and 70's, Zodiac is not your usual true crime film.

Jake Gyllenhaal plays Robert Graysmith, a cartoonist at the San Francisco Chronicle, who becomes obsessed with discovering the identity of the killer who has labelled themself 'ZODIAC'. When the killer begins sending letters to the newspaper, Graysmith takes an active interest in the case. But this is not just Graysmith's story, it is also the story of crime reporter Paul Avery (portrayed superbly by Robert Downey Jr) and lead police officer David Toschi (Mark Ruffalo in his best performance to date). You get to see how the crimes affect the three and how their lives were changed because of the killings and subsequent hunt for the killer.

The supporting cast is a who's who of acting pedigree, from Brian Cox's lawyer to Philip Baker Hall as a document's expert.

Many true crime films rely on heavy violence to tell the story, Zodiac does not. Whilst you see some of the murders, they are never portrayed in a gratuitous or exploitative way. The focus on the film being on the obsession of the main characters rather than the sensationalism of the crimes.

Even though the film has a running time of 158 minutes, the pacing of the film means that you never get bored. It is so tightly edited that not a moment of screen time is wasted. Added to that, you have a constant undercurrent of suspense that puts many modern horror films to shame. There are some scary moments, and none more than the fact that this is a true story.

Fincher is a master of visual style and this film is no different. The film looks like a seventies film (even down to classic 70's Warner and Paramount logos at the start).

The film also stays true to the source material, Graysmith's book 'Zodiac', and does not veer off into any moments of dramatic license. It is fact based, and because of this engages the audience more.

This is my film of the year so far. It is thought provoking and so well made it should be a blue print for how true crime films should be made. Great performances by all involved and the attention to detail is amazing (even down to radio adverts for the Rolling Stones' Altamont gig).

The film is up there with the best of true crime films, such as The Boston Strangler and To Catch A Killer. This is David Fincher, and his cast, on top form.

[Highly rated reviewer]

Zodiac

Almost 40 years since his crimes the Zodiac case remains open, one of America's most infamous unsolved murder cases. This film is based on the book by Robert Graysmith (Gyllenhaal) documenting both the police investigation and Graysmith's own inquiries into the case and laying out the case against the man he suspects of the killings. This is fantastic material for a movie and particularly for David Fincher, whose previous vernture in the serial killer/police procedural genre was Se7en.

Where, then, has it all gone so very wrong?

The problems are legion but perhaps the biggest is that David Fincher appears not to have made one film. He's made two and slapped them rather awkwardly together. The first film is about the Zodiac killings and the Police investigation. The hero is Mark Ruffalo's Detective Toschi and on the periphery hang Robert Downey Jr as a crime reporter and Gyllenhaal as Graysmith. Gyllenhaal has nothing to do for almost two hours besides hover over Downey's desk. Then comes film two in which Gyllenhaal takes over hero duties as Graysmith mounts his investigation years after the killings.

There's an awkwardness to the whole film. Characters drift in and out (for an hour in the middle you may forget that Gyllenhaal is in the movie) and some (Chloe Sevigny) could be lifted out of the film entirely without trouble. Nobody has an arc so there's no real investment in the characters. With this comes another big problem; because I don't really care about these people it's also hard to care about the events they are investigating. There's little tension here and certainly not the ever present foreboding that you feel in Se7en.

Even at almost three hours Zodiac has odd things missing, particularly criminal is that Fincher neglects to show us Graysmith cracking Zodiac's second code, despite the fact one of the few things we really get to know about him is how much he loves solving puzzles.

I can't really fault the acting. Downey is on excellent twitchy form and Anthony Edwards is great in a supporting role and Fincher's direction is as technically brilliant as ever. It's just that the film is a mess. It as if Fincher couldn't find his focus so he simply threw in everything and the kitchen sink. A horrible let down.

[Highly rated reviewer]

Good true life crime thriller...

This is issed remarkably close to the previous film 'Zodiac' released in 2005, the 2005 version is quite good, and is packaged very similarly and deals with preciserly the same subject , that is where the similarities end.

At 2 hours 40 minutes the new film is a bum number, but even though it seems overlong, it certainly grips you into watching and maintains your interest throughout.

The main bonus for me was the performance of Robert Downey Jr as the maveric reporter Paul Avery, it was very watchable indeed.

I would definately say, if you have the time on your hands, this is a definate recommended movie that ties up some loose ends from the 2005 version. Well worth a watch.

Very Good

This film focusses on the 'Zodiac' serial killer. Or rather it focusses on the people trying to solve his crimes and identify him.

This is a thoroughly enjoyable film, and I recommend watching it. It's a thriller most definitly, but with a more interesting and detailed story than I've seen in a thriller for a long time.

Its really is that bad!!

Probably one of the most boring films I have seen in a while.

Dont get this if you are expecting a silence of the lambs type film. Do get this if you are the sort of person that enjoys watching paint dry. Its about 3 hours of my life wasted on this tat that I am never going to get back!

Dull, dull, dull.................

A promising start, but you soon discover that the characters are all uninteresting, the plot is almost non-existent and the denouement is possibly the most disappointing in film history. Half way through I felt like giving up on it, at the end I wish I had. Oh, and it's far too long!

[Highly rated reviewer]

Wake up!

Only watch this film if you are a chronic insomniac and sudoko fan. There were some interesting performances by the main players but that aside it tortured you with a minute by minute crawl through the story. My hubbie and I both fell asleep at different points and were disappointed to wake up and find that we had only moved on one year and were none the wiser as to what was going on. If you want my prediction, 'Zodiac' is destined to be forgotten.

snooze time

This film was so boring I very nearly fell asleep, a complete waste of 2 1/2 hours of my night, very disappointed after waiting so long to see this film.

killing you softly

Don't expect any of the gimmicks or visual trickery or rug-from-under-feet moves which characterised Fight Club, Se7en or Alien 3, fond of all of them though I am. This is masterfully controlled film-making and lovingly unravelling storytelling - the kind that needs no embellishment or pyrotechnics. Beloved as I am of Gyllenhaal and Downey - even Dr Mark Greene from off of ER - it is unfair to single any actor out as this is an ensemble piece first and foremost. Much has been made of the length, but it is worth it - it is a classic and I, for one, am proud to be able to say I saw it on its weekend of release. If that makes me sad, so be it! I cannot wait for Fincher's next release.

Best of an otherwise dry year so far...

Nothing short of impressive, in concept and in execution. Fincher seems to have a wide vocabulary of filmmaking tools, and, perhaps more importantly, the confidence to employ them, for various means. This is a deep, intelligent and convincing delve into subjective verisimilitude, with not only shifting character identities, but a self-conscious nod to how the film has come to be made: the author of the book from which it is adapted remarks at one point, 'I'm thinking of writing a book', and, years later, we see it as a bestseller on shelves at an airport. The viewer, like everyone else inside the film, has, at the end of it all, no real concrete idea of who the Zodiac killer is. The one difference, however, is that we're viewing events not as victims, but as viewers to a manipulated narration of events. Fincher knows this; the opening is incredibly tense, frightening and finally shocking, as we see it through the eyes of the boy, the killer's first victim (in the film if not real life); later, when we revisit this first murder, we 'watch' it again (mentally, because we're not shown it) through the girl's eyes, since it is revealed or supposed that she knew who the killer was. To go through the film scene-by-scene identifying all the different gazes through which we identify with the film's meaning would take far too long (though it would surely be beneficial to the appreciation of how immensely intelligent it is), but a few points to note: the point at which Gyllenhall's obsessed cartoonist has come to the foray of investigations is the point at which the actual killings are far in the past (both in story time, which is years, and narrative time, which is hours) and the identity of the killer is at its most obscure and elusive (because of all the endless details and clues cluttering up the narrative, and the emphasis on basic demarcations such as handwriting and fingerprints). There's one scene, in which he is persuaded down into the basement of an elderly man's home, who began the scene as a possible witness and before descending rapidly into prime suspect - he hasn't really, of course, but it's constructed, like the rest of the film, so that we view the film through a certain character's psychological state, and so when he turns off the basement light, all sorts of things are suggested. Soon after, alone at home, Gyllenhall hears his back door open, and the moving shadow on the wall takes on an almost expressionistic effect in creating meaning, in this case the absurd paranoia of his character - but for a title at the end, we might even doubt whether he received anonymous, heavy-breathing phone calls at all. There's one moment, too, early on, which shows somebody who we assume to be the killer, shown with the non-diegetic phone call of him informing the police of another killing - it seems out-of-place in a film about an unsolved murder spree, but it's decidedly clever, in further mystifying the entire case in (fictional) retrospect. Fincher employs his usually smooth pans, tracks and shot-to-shot transitions as well as proving how far ahead of most others he is at CGI - some of the period reconstructions are flawless and beautiful, including a birdseye-view tracking shot of a taxicab on its way to murder, and a gorgeous establishing shot of the Golden Gate Bridge - again, even if this time the city is specific and not anonymous (like in Seven), he is very, very effective in evoking location. At 160 minutes, its duration belies the discipline with which it has been made: every direction it takes, be it a cut, shift in gaze or narrative thread, a pan or a track, seems motivated.