Zodiac (David Fincher)

In terms of outright cranks, which forum has more of them, SH or Zodiac?

 

There's a lady on the Zodiac forum from the SF area who had a number of wild claims about her interactions with the Zodiac long after his attributed murders stopped. She seems to be in good standing with the more sober members of the forum, including the owner.

 

I think the Zodiac may be a member here.

 

Based on the true story, the film follows the investigators path through several leads before introducing the Strangler as a character. It is seen almost exclusively from the point of view of the investigators who have very few clues to build a case upon.

 

All his cyphers just translate to 'I think 'Red Rose Speedway' and 'Wild Life' are underrated.

 

I WILL NOT GIVE YOU MY NAME BECAUSE YOU WILL TRY TO SLOW DOWN OR STOP MY COLLECTING OF RARE AUDIOPHILE MASTERINGS

 

The time has come. I confess.

 

Hi!

 

'When I die, all of the Japanese and other superior foreign pressings I've collected of 'Dark Side of the Moon' will become my slaves in paradise!'

 

Doing Dark Side shootouts for all eternity...that does sound like some members' idea of paradise!

 

I also have the Blu Ray, which as many have said is a great release. A great opening. Such an atmosphere of foreboding in many scenes, especially when Graysmith goes to visit the house of the man who worked at the cinema. Creeped me out. I must watch it again. Do watch his remake of THE GIRL WITH THE RED DRAGON TATTOO for a dose of the same atmosphere.

 

Sorta anticlimactic ending.

Liked the Dirty Harry cinema scene.

 

Hell more like.

 

I'm fascinated with stories like these (kind of like the Black Dahlia); things that were never solved. In a way I feel guilty because families of these people suffered great tragedies, and I feel terrible for them. And it isn't even always murders, it's things like Amelia Earhart, or that story about the guy who had a passport from a country that didn't exist (The Man From Taured, the story usually goes). I find it all fascinating.

 

I too watch it about once a year. I think it is Fincher's best movie. So good!

 

I think that was a great move, considering that if they got factual, the movie would have had an X rating for both violence and nudity. One day, they will remake it with much more nudity and violence, the way Hollywood has no imagination.

 

BTW, the BBC put Zodiac at number 12 on its list of the best films of the 21st Century, the highest Fincher film on the list.

 

Who'd have thought that song could sound so menacing.

 

A great movie. I was especially drawn into it as I vaguely remembered it in the news at the time (later 70s) as a kid but didn't know the outcome.

Mark Ruffalo as Detective David Toschi was the star of the movie for me.
The real detective.


Cool info, wiki: "
George Lucas gave an interview to Empire magazine once stating that the Zodiac murders captured his imagination at the time as a high schooler and then college student at USC, and he always felt like Toschi was harshly judged for how the investigation was handled. He explained this is why he named a location on Tatooine Toschi Station, "in honor of the SFPD inspector."

Steve McQueen copied Toschi's distinctive style of quick-draw shoulder-holster by wearing his gun upside down for the 1968 movie Bullitt. McQueen also modeled much of his Bullitt character on Toschi.

Screenwriters Harry Julian Fink and also modeled Harry Callahan, the main character of Dirty Harry portrayed by Clint Eastwood, on Toschi; the film's villain, based on the Zodiac Killer, was called "The Scorpio Killer" (portrayed by Andrew J. Robinson)."

I had to bail on the movie. It was just too dour for me, which indicates how well done it was.

I had never read anything about serial killers and only knew the most famous names before watching Zodiac. Of course I read up on the case after the movie, which led to reading about a number of other cases solved and unsolved. Wow did I ever feel downright naive after for I didn't know there were that many persons who were just plain murderous out there with that one goal. I had no idea! No kidding, I haven't gone to bed since without double checking that our door is secure.
Afterward I didn't find "The Zodiac Killer" all that interesting. Of the unsolved crimes I became more interested in the "East Area Rapist/ Original Night Stalker" also called "The Diamond Knot Killer" and "Golden State Killer" of California who from 1976 to 1979 broke into homes and raped 50 times (reported) before murdering 10 between 1979 and 1986. Outrageous!

 

+1 to all to most of this for me.

It's funny, probably 15+ years ago I saw an episode of the A&E show "Cold Case Files" about the Zodiac Killer and that started my obsession with that case. An obsession that just built over time with Fincher's film.

I've always been into true crime as far back as I can remember, watching "Unsolved Mysteries" as an adolescent in the late 80s. Those cases, big and small, always freaked me out.

None more freaky or downright terrifying than EAR/ONS/GSK though, I have to agree. If there was one case I could say the word on and it would be solved and we would know who he was, it would be EAR/ONS/GSK. Around the same time as the afore mentioned A&E episode about Zodiac, they did one on EAR/ONS. It was the first time I had ever heard of the case but that started me down an obsessive road. Until recent years (last 5-7), there wasn't a ton out there on this case. E! did a THS on it that's very good. There have been a few others.

This case though, definitely not for the faint of heart. 50 rapes and 10 murders. And there's so many victims and nuances and detectives involved. It's crazy. Did he start as the 'Visalia Ransacker' and graduate to the East Area Rapist and then to ONS? And of course, most importantly, Is he still alive? The DNA confirms it's the same individual for all of the rapes and murders.

Why this case has never garnered the type of attention of say, Zodiac, is really a mystery; because of the sheer brutality and terror. Perhaps because of the different monikers, the activity spread over multiple jurisdictions and over multiple years helped keep it under the radar.

Most recently, as I'm sure your aware, the true crime writer Michelle McNamara (late wife of comedian Patton Oswalt) had written extensively on the EAR/ONS case even coining the name Golden State Killer. She was in the process of writing a book at the time of her death. I actually had been eagerly awaiting a puff of smoke about the book when I learned of her untimely death last year. Maybe some day it will be finished and be released. But, I digress.

For anyone that does want to open the door and shine a light onto this one, I suggest reading Mrs. McNamara's exceptional essay done for L.A. Magazine in 2013. In The Footsteps of a Killer: The Writer’s Cut - Los Angeles Magazine

This is one of those where I feel like...someone has to know SOMETHING. Although, maybe not... I doubt Dennis Rader or Gary Ridgway's family knew who they really was either.

 

From what people on the forum dedicated to the ONS rapist/killer have said it seems Patton Oswalt has committed to finishing the book that his wife had dedicated herself to. It truly is a sickening reign of terror this guy had and we can only hope it is some day solved.

 

No doubt the Zodiac's disguise and intentionally cryptic communications have been why it has prominence over greater yet more mundane crimes. I find the production of the movie fascinating. Zodiac (film) - Wikipedia
A reason the movie is so good is that such great care was taken in its making, with among other things, interviewing all persons involved with the actual crimes including having the two surviving victims as consultants. Again, fascinating how these real life crimes did touch the lives of the film makers. 'Fincher was drawn to this story because he spent much of his childhood in San Anselmo in Marin County during the initial Zodiac murders. "I remember coming home and saying the highway patrol had been following our school buses for a couple weeks now. And my dad, who worked from home, and who was very dry, not one to soft-pedal things, turned slowly in his chair and said: 'Oh yeah. There's a serial killer who has killed four or five people, who calls himself Zodiac, who's threatened to take a high-powered rifle and shoot out the tires of a school bus, and then shoot the children as they come off the bus.'" For Fincher as a young boy, the killer "was the ultimate boogeyman".'

Every aspect of the making of this movie is amazing to me. Some things I knew but others I had either forgotten or never knew. That "All the President's Men" was the "template" for this, being as much about the investigators as the pursued. That two of my favourite photographers, William Eggleston and Stephen Shore were referenced to get a 70s look. That Gary Oldman was rejected from the role as Melvin Bellini because he "didn't have the girth". That composer David Shire of "All the President's Men" and "The Conversation" worked on Zodiac's score: ' "There are 12 signs of the Zodiac and there is a way of using atonal and tonal music. So we used 12 tones, never repeating any of them but manipulating them". He used specific instruments to represent the characters: the trumpet for Toschi, the solo piano for Graysmith and the dissonant strings for the Zodiac killer.'

Just amazing!

 

As someone who was too young and too far away (in the UK) as a child, I didn't really know anything about he Zodiac killings, other than Dirty Harry's Scorpio killer was loosely based on him. However, that changed when I bought Graysmith's book, in a sale, for a couple of $'s, while visiting my Sister in law in Indiana in 1993. I read that book from cover to cover a couple of times whilst I was there.

Eventually, I caught the film on the BBC a couple of years ago and it is just as I remembered it. A fabulous film, great atmosphere (I hated all the phones ringing in the newspaper office, but now I don't mind), great acting and a wonderful contemporary music score. I re-watch it every couple of months..it's that good. Ruffolo reminds me of a young Columbo ha ha, but all 3 main actors are superb, in my view.

 

Yeah, I thought when I seen it in the cinema if this a been made sometime in the seventies it would have had more female nudity. These days it's ok for a dude to get his kit off on screen, but not for females now, screwed pc universe. But, as storytelling and acting goes in Fincher's film, impeccable.

 

Creepier if you ask me