David Fincher(director of Fight Club, Se7en) is back with his 2nd attempt into Crime thriller genere.
The movie is based on books authoerd by Robert Graysmiths bout the real life notorious Zodiac, a serial killer who terrorized San
Francisco with a string of seemingly random murders during the 1960s
and 1970s.
Robert Graysmith(Jake Gyllenhaal) is a cartoonist in a leading newspaper which gets a series of letters by a unkown person claiming to be the responsible for the killings of a young couple and demands that his letters along with his ciphers to be printed in the newspaper else he would go on a killing spree.
Paul Avery(Robert Downey Jr) plays the crime reporter who slowly gets invovled in the case and tries to solve the case along with the police department.Inspector David Toschi(Mark Ruffalo) and Inspector William Armstrong(Anthony Edwards) have been assigned the case of the zodiac killer.
What follows is a series of investigations, flase leads and dozens of suspects and case which goes on for several years leading to frustration among many officers.As time goes by Robert Graysmith who used to follow this case for his own sake decides to take upon his shoulder about finding out the identity of the zodiac killer.
This is not a average hollywood crime thriller, this is based upon the actual police case files and shows accurately the frustration which must be going on inside the minds of people involved with it as the case drags on for more than a decade.David Fincher deserves all the credit of making a tight thriller in which everything goes on with the flow, the flim gets tiring in between as it is of long duration but fincher manages to get back the atttention of the audiance with some brilliant scenes
But a major credit should go the actors.Jake Gyllenhaal plays his charcter with a certain nerdiness and obbsession which makes him fun to watch.He has matured as a actor from his Donnie Darko days.Mark Ruffalo who plays this dedicated and worked detective with a dash of humor is brilliant.Robert Downey Jr(he looks very different) in his small role adds his witty touch instantly.
This movie correctly potrays the chronological order of the zodiac case.As an audiance I started to feel equally paranoid and confused as the detectives would have felt during those years.This a dialouge-driven thriller which is certainly a bit boring at some parts but in all is a brilliant movie in itself.This may not be David Fincher’s best but it is still great.