David Fincher's ZODIAC - trailer alert!

[Kunac]

Pogledajte ovaj trailer i iznesite vaše ospervacije:

http://playlist.yahoo.com/makeplaylist.dll?id=1522103&sdm=web&qtw=640&qth=400

[crippled_avenger]

Nije me narocito zainteresovao...

[Kunac]

Nije me narocito zainteresovao...

Misliš da će biti lošije od Anđela 3?

[crippled_avenger]

Pa, Petar Pasic se jako lozi na Finchera i zeli da veruje kako je A3 za njega, ono sto je ALIEN 3 za Finchera...

Sama prica ZODIACa je lame, i sa svim ogranicenjima istinite price, ne lici na nesto sto je idealan materijal za Finchera... Meni ovo lici na nesto sa SUMMER OF SAM teritorije...

[Oroluin]

Rekao bih da je ovo tipičan triler. Verovatno dobro urađen, mada bez posebnih efekata (ako ih nema u trejleru, malo je verovatno da ih ima inače ).
A bila bi fora da je onaj pandur u stvari ubica.

[Kastor]

A bila bi fora da je onaj pandur u stvari ubica.

Sumnjam da bi se odvažili na toliko skretanje sa istinite priče, uzimajući u obzir da su se toliko trudili da priču vizuelno smeste u to vreme.

[krema]

Cek, cek, jel ono jedan od filmova iz serijala o Prljavom Hariju bio na temu Zodiaka? Davno sam gledao, pokusavam se sjetiti.

[Ghoul]

Cek, cek, jel ono jedan od filmova iz serijala o Prljavom Hariju bio na temu Zodiaka? Davno sam gledao, pokusavam se sjetiti.

ne jedan od, no prvi i najbolji.

[krema]

Ha, znaci ipak se nisam prevario. Jebo te, otkad te filmove gledao nisam.

[Oroluin]

A znači u tem je stvar...

АЈ НОУ ВОТ ЈУР ТИНКИНГ ПАНК...

[Kunac]

Meni se nekako čini da neće bit loše. Fincher je to, bre. Čovek nema loš film.  

[Kastor]

Fincher je to, bre. Čovek nema loš film.  

Baš tako.

'El sam ja potpuno dezinformisan ili njegovi filmovi prolaze slabo na blagajnama? Mrzi me sad da istražujem, ako neko zna neka ispljune.

[Kunac]

Od bioskopskog prikazivanja u SAD, Fincherovi filmovi su zaradili sledeće svote:
Seven 100 miliona $
Panic Room 96 miliona $
Alien 3 55 miliona $
The Game 48 miliona $
Fight Club 37 miliona $
To, generalno, nije uopšte loše. Jedino je FIGHT CLUB bio finansijski promašaj - ali je sjano prošao u Evropi i ostatku sveta. SEVEN je, na primer, koštao 33 miliona $ - a ukupno je zaradio 10X više - i to samo od bioskopske distribucije, DVD i TV prava da ne pominjemo.
Znači, Finch je "zlatna koka" - most of the time.

[---]

inačer, i u povjerenju, na probnoj projekciji ljudi su se žalili da im je film predugačak (nije ni čudo, šuting skript ima preko 180 strana), da im scene ubistva nisu naročito ubedljive i da nisu zadovoljni krajem (natpisi šta se dogodilo sa junacima).
gvirnuo sam malko i u scenario, koliko se moglo, i vrlooo sam skeptičan... nekako mi sve liči da je krip bio u pravu.
ali hajde, ovi još prepravljaju i peglaju, pa da sačekamo mart...

[---]

kad ne lezi vraze...

Fincher's Brilliant Zodiac: Preview
Based on the true story of a serial killer who terrified the San Francisco Bay Area and taunted authorities in four jurisdictions with his ciphers and letters for decades, "Zodiac," David Fincher's new movie in five years is an epic-scale psychological thriller—and his best work since "The Fight Club," and perhaps even "Se7en."

Rest assured: "Zodiac" is not a grisly or macabre horror film in the mode of "Se7en," and it's not a genre picture in the vein of "Panic Room," Fincher's last, narrow-minded movie that was confined to one space. A massive undertaking, thematically, narratively, and technically, "Zodiac" is a sprawling American masterpiece, a darkly humorous story that spans three decades and involves at least two dozen characters that are fully developed.

I will review the movie in detail later, but for now I'd like to share my enthusiasm for a densely rich, mesmerizing picture that recalls the most significant American movies of the 1970s, when most of its story is set, films like "Klute," "Serpico," "Dog Day's Afternoon," "All the President's Men," and "Network." The best compliment I can pay Fincher is to suggest that Sidney Lumet, Hal Ashby, Sydney Pollack, Allan Pakula, to mention some of the decade's masters, would be proud of his endlessly intriguing picture, one that's effective as a psychological thriller and a classic newsroom-detective story.

Scripted by James Vanderbilt, "Zodiac" is based on Robert Graysmith's two published books about the case: "Zodiac" and "Zodiac Unmasked." With more than 400 million copies worldwide, "Zodiac" is now in its 39th printing; "Zodiac Unmasked" is in its seventh edition.

Narrtaive Premise

All of Fincher's works are marked by the vocabulary of film noir, reflected in theme, style, and tone. "Zodiac" is no different, dealing as it is with one of noir's most consistent themes: Obsession.

Haunting down the hunter becomes the obsession of four men, each engaged in the case with his own personal and professional resources and with his idiosyncratic personality. In due time, this obsession turns the quartet into ghosts of their former selves. Their lives are built but also and destroyed by the killer's endless murders and endless trail of clues.

Who are the Characters?

In "Zodiac," the San Francisco's cartoonist Robert Graysmith, who played an instrumental role in the investigation, is played by Jake Gyllenhaal (Oscar-nominated last year for "Brokeback Mountain"). Graysmith is the wild card and most idealistic of the bunch.

A shy editorial cartoonist, initially (but also initially), Graysmith did not have the cache and expertise of his seasoned and cynical colleague at the San Francisco's Chronicle, Paul Avery. Graysmith lacked Avery's connection with San Francisco Police Department's ambitious Inspector Dave Tosci (Mark Ruffalo) and his low-key, meticulous partner William Armstrong (Anthony Edwards). What Graysmith did have was commitment to the cause, boundless energy, and a crucial insight that no one else anticipated, one that appeared August 1, 1969. (Remember the date when you see the movie).

Paul Avery

Paul Avery (played with bravura and panache by Robert Downy Jr.) is the Chronicle's star crime reporter. Downey Jr. is the only actor who plays a man that is no longer alive, but Fincher says: "Robert had such enthusiasm, and because he is someone who could really grasp Paul's inner demons, he was perfect for the role."

Basic Facts

It all begins, when a crudely written "Letter to the Editor" arrives in the day's pile of mail. It's one of the three letters penned to the San Francisco Chronicle, the San Francisco Examiner, and the Vallejo Times-Herald. The letter's content brings the newsrooms to a standstill. It says: "Dear Editor. This is the murderer" of David Faraday and Betty Lou Jensen, shot to death December 20, 1968, on Lake Herman Road in Solano County, and the July 4, 1969 fatal shooting of Darlene Ferrin and attempted murder of Mike Mageau at the Blue Rock Springs golf course parking lot in Vallejo.

The killer doesn't call them by name, but he gives a long list of details that only the police--and he--could know.

Each paper was given part of a cipher which, when decoded, would reportedly reveal the murderer's identity. It's followed by a severe threat--publish the letter or more would perish. No killer since Jack the Ripper had written to the press and had taunted the police with clues to his identity. Zodiac had raised the bar for homicidal psychopaths in the U.S.

Twists and Turns

One of the turning points occurs, when a couple in Salinas decode the message. But it's Graysmith, a cipher amateur-enthusiast, who decodes the letter's hidden intent, a reference to the 1932 silent film, "The Most Dangerous Game."

More letters and threats follow. On September 27, 1969, Zodiac strikes again. Hooded and armed with a gun and sheathed blade, he stabs to death Cecilia Ann Shepard, and leaves for dead Bryan Hartnell, while the young couple was having a picnic at Lake Berryessa in Napa County.

One month later, on October 11, 1969, the killer comes to San Francisco. Taxi driver Paul Lee Shine is shot in the back of the head in the posh Presidio Heights neighborhood. Three days later, a fifth letter arrives, the most ominous of all. Zodiac tells the police that they could have caught him that night. Worse, school children are in the cross hairs of his gun sight. Zodiac threatens to pick them off as they step off the school bus. With this alarming note, San Francisco becomes literally a city in panic andf fear--a city that never sleeps.

Famous or Infamous

Zodiac inadvertently turns detectives Toschi and Armstrong and reporter Avery into overnight celebs. Characters based on Tosci would prove pivotal roles. launching three movie stars' careers.

But, again, it's Graysmith who remains the most committed to his armchair sleuthing from the sidelines, injecting his input when Avery follows. Zodiac is always one step ahead, covering his tracks, peppering his lettered taunts with more threats. Then they become personal.

Unfortunately, infamy eclipses fame. Soon, Toschi falls from grace; a frustrated Armstrong moves on to another career and lifestyle; Avery leaves the paper, crippled by his drinking and drug addictions.

Zodiac no longer reveals his targets. Copycats spring up coast to coast. But as of the 1980s, the key suspect is still out there. It seems that Graysmith's great moment has arrived, a moment that would forever change all the lives concerned since the brutal murder in 1969, or even 1966.

[---]

http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/archives/2007/02/zodiac_finally.php

ima i slika...

[lenny]

Fincher je dostigao takav status, najvise na on line zajednici filmskih kriticara i posvecenika, u Americi naravno, da se njegov novi filma iskljucivo posmatra u kategorijama najvisih filmskih dostignuca, koja god ona da su.

 On jos uvek nije zvanicno priznat kao mejnstrim majstor, oskari, nagrade, jednoglasni usklici kriticarske javnosti, status koji sada dobija Paul Greengrass npr. Mada  razlog za to je samo zato shto je posle FC usledio popcorn flick PanicRoom, kako mislim da ga je i on sam nazvao u jednom trenutku, a ne jos jedan ozbiljan film.  

 Zodiac je zato odlicna prilika da se mnogi kriticari koji sebe video kao alternativne, progresivne ili kako god,( oni koji nisu drulovali nad Crashom, Million Dollar B, Babelom, Brobackom i sl.) utrkuju ko ce pre, glasnije, orginalnije i sveobuhvatnije  oznaciti  i proglasiti genijalnost Finchera kao istinskog vizionara i majstora filma, koju on, eto napokon, i zasluzuje.

 Odlaganje prikazivanja filma samo je stvorilo vecu svest o filmu, neverovatni buzz i bes na  studije sto su zarad kalkulanstva onemogucili priznanja, u vidu oskara i kriticarskih nagrada s kraja godine, i tako ocigledno podcenili dragulj u svojim rukama.  Te u celoj prici, Fincheru na ruku ide i  motiv  sukoba pravog umetnika i surove industrije.

Hvalospevi i usklici ne mogu izostati, bar od strane tih out of the box kriticara.   Ako film propadne na blagajnama,  shto ce se verovatno dogoditi ako se ne javi opsti kosenzus svih kriticara kako je film izvrstan ( mada i ako se konsenzus stvori film i dalje moze da prodje lose), film ce minimum doziveti momentalni kultni status, nesto poput Fountaina ove zime.

[---]

nije neki clanak, ali ajde, nek ide zivot...

February 18, 2007
Lights, Bogeyman, Action
By DAVID M. HALBFINGER
NEW ORLEANS

DAVID FINCHER, impolitic as ever, is ridiculing the notes he's been getting from the studio executives overseeing his latest film, "Zodiac."

" 'It's easy to get lost in all the details,' " he intones, reading their critique of one scene from his laptop. " 'Are there any trims you could make here to cut down on the information and focus it even more' " on two main characters?

"I love this," Mr. Fincher says, leaving no doubt as to his sarcasm. "It's this weird shell game where they go, 'Can you focus it more on the people by making it be less of them?' And of course what it really gets down to is that they want me to audition their cuts to them."

But he won't. Instead, he says, "you just rope-a-dope."

That same uncompromising attitude extended to his relationship with the cast, led by Mark Ruffalo, Robert Downey Jr. and Jake Gyllenhaal, who endured multiple takes of 70 shots and beyond. Mr. Downey affectionately called him a disciplinarian, while Mr. Gyllenhaal, saying that as a director he "paints with people," added, "It's tough to be a color."

At 44, Mr. Fincher remains Hollywood's reigning bad-boy auteur, and his impatience with meddling has become as famous as his tendency to test his actors' patience, stamina and preparation. But not as famous as his films, the most celebrated among them "Se7en," the 1995 thriller that grossed $350 million worldwide, and "Fight Club," his over-the-top answer to young male anomie.

After five years of withdrawing from one project after another, Mr. Fincher will present "Zodiac," about the serial killer who terrorized San Francisco in the late 70s, on March 2. Then, in 2008, comes "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button," the screenwriter Eric Roth's epic reimagining of F. Scott Fitzgerald's story about a man who ages in reverse. (Of more interest to some fans, "Benjamin Button" will reunite him with the star of "Se7en" and "Fight Club," Brad Pitt, and amounts to a sharp turn for Mr. Fincher into romanticism.)

To trim "Zodiac" to just over two and a half hours, Mr. Fincher said he had to make painful cuts. Gone, for example, is a two-minute blackout over a montage of hit songs signaling the passage of time from Joni Mitchell to Donna Summer; in its place, artless but quick and cheap, are the words "Four years later."

Mr. Fincher has always been outspoken, but if he takes this movie a little more personally, there's a reason: For him, the Zodiac murderer, who terrorized the Bay Area and was never caught, isn't just any old serial-killer story.

Raised in Marin County, Mr. Fincher was only 7 when the area was seized with fear in 1969. "I remember coming home and saying the highway patrol had been following our school buses for a couple weeks now," he recalled in December in an interview in New Orleans, where he was editing "Zodiac" while filming "Benjamin Button." "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.' "

"I was, like, 'You could drive us to school,' " he recalled thinking.

It was that same sense that initially drew him to "Se7en," he said: the fearsome power of the stranger among us. "That's what Zodiac was for a 7-year-old growing up in San Anselmo. He was the ultimate bogeyman."

"People ask me, 'When are you going to make your 'Amarcord?' " Mr. Fincher added, with a little laugh at the comparison to Fellini's autobiographical tour-de-force. For now, he said, "It'll have to be 'Zodiac.' "

Much has been made of Mr. Fincher's "dark eye," his gloomy palette and dim view of human nature, as seen not just in his hits but in his lesser films "The Game" and "Panic Room." And he's had a reputation for cutting-edge special effects and innovative camerawork since, at 22, he directed his first commercial, for the American Cancer Society, featuring a fetus smoking a cigarette in utero, an ad that led to an early career as a top music-video director.

But the source of his dark-hued lens on life, Mr. Fincher suggested, might be as simple as that original bogeyman. "It was a very interesting and weird time to grow up, and incredibly evocative," he said. "I have a handful of friends who were from Marin County at the same time, the same age group, and they're all very kind of sinister, dark, sardonic people. And I wonder if Zodiac had something to do with that."

Mr. Fincher was first approached about "Zodiac" by Brad Fischer, a producer at Phoenix Pictures, with a script by James Vanderbilt. It was based on two books by Robert Graysmith, a former San Francisco Chronicle cartoonist who became obsessed with the Zodiac, and who built a case against one suspect, now dead. Mr. Fincher said he wanted Mr. Vanderbilt to overhaul the script, but wanted first to dig into the original police sources. So director, writer and producer spent months interviewing witnesses, investigators and the case's only two surviving victims, and poring over reams of documents.

"I said I won't use anything in this book that we don't have a police report for," Mr. Fincher said. "There's an enormous amount of hearsay in any circumstantial case, and I wanted to look some of these people in the eye and see if I believed them. It was an extremely difficult thing to make a movie that posthumously convicts somebody."

Mr. Graysmith said Mr. Fincher's team found evidence that investigators had missed. "He outdid the police," Mr. Graysmith said. "My hat's off to them."

With a finished script and a $75 million budget, Mr. Fincher and Phoenix approached Sony, then invited other studios to bid. The most aggressive, Warner Brothers and Paramount, decided to team up. At the same time Paramount invited Warner to share the $150 million budget for "Benjamin Button." So Mr. Fincher agreed to do the two movies back to back.

The result has been a marathon. "Zodiac" required 115 shooting days, about twice the average, though it came in under budget; "Benjamin Button," which is still shooting in New Orleans, will take 150 days, not counting months to complete the illusion of Mr. Pitt's metamorphosis from newborn old man to demented, dying baby.

Perhaps most challenging for "Zodiac," Mr. Fincher said, were the adjustments he made as a director — both in adopting a quieter visual style and in trying to get the most from his cast.

"It's as unadorned a movie as I've ever made," he said. "It's just people talking, and it's hard to make an audience realize that they have to be paying attention. One way you do that is by not doing very much." There are none of the "perceptual games" that he said he played in "Fight Club," where the subject was "the most unreliable narrator possible," for example. "It was like, cast the movie right, get the script right, shoot the scenes as simply as we can and get out of everyone's way," he said.

Mr. Fincher said the last thing he wanted was for an audience to seize on period details like an avocado-colored rotary phone, or an actor's sideburns, and miss the point of a scene. In several days on the set in San Francisco and Los Angeles in late 2005 and early 2006, he could be seen constantly retaking shots to dim a lamp, remove a too-colorful car, or alter the costume of an extra whose garb seemed lifted from a fashion layout rather than what people really wore.

Mark Ruffalo, who stars as the lead detective, said "Zodiac" was unlike any other Fincher film. "He's just completely gone for the character and the story, and has sort of made that the rule, and not the look," he said. Near the end of filming, Mr. Ruffalo recalled, Mr. Fincher said he'd watched a rough assemblage of about half the movie. "He said: 'I think it's great, but I'm in territory I've never been before. I just don't know if they're going to get it. And that's exciting news: 'Here's my brand, and I'm stepping outside of it.' "

More difficult was changing the way Mr. Fincher worked with, and made demands of, his actors. On "Panic Room" he grew frustrated with his process — detailed storyboarding and previsualization to diagram a movie shot-by-shot — because it left little room for discovery, Mr. Fincher said. "It just felt wrong, like I didn't get the most out of the actors, because I was so rigid in my thinking," he said. "I was kind of impatiently waiting for everybody to get where I'd already been a year and a half ago. And I've been trying to nip that in the bud. I felt like I needed to be more attentive to watching the actors."

He added: "Every once in a while there are actors you can defeat."

For Jake Gyllenhaal, who stars in the movie as Mr. Graysmith, Mr. Fincher's attentiveness was a mixed blessing.

Mr. Gyllenhaal said he came from a collaborative filmmaking family: "We share ideas, and we incorporate those ideas." He added: "David knows what he wants, and he's very clear about what he wants, and he's very, very, very smart. But sometimes we'd do a lot of takes, and he'd turn, and he would say, because he had a computer there" — the movie was shot digitally — " 'Delete the last 10 takes.' And as an actor that's very hard to hear."

Mr. Gyllenhaal, 26, partly blamed culture shock; he'd just finished "Jarhead" for Sam Mendes, who gave him a much freer rein. Mr. Gyllenhaal stressed that he admired and liked Mr. Fincher personally. And he noted that other members of the "Zodiac" cast had far more experience, adding: "I wish I could've had the maturity to be like: 'I know what he wants. He wants the best out of me.' "

That said, Mr. Gyllenhaal spoke candidly about his frustration with Mr. Fincher's degree of control over his performance.

"What's so wonderful about movies is, you get your shot," he said. "They even call it a shot. The stakes are high. You get your chance to prove what you can do. You get a take, 5 takes, 10 takes. Some places, 90 takes. But there is a stopping point. There's a point at which you go, 'That's what we have to work with.' But we would reshoot things. So there came a point where I would say, well, what do I do? Where's the risk?"

Told of Mr. Gyllenhaal's comments, Mr. Fincher half-jokingly said, "I hate earnestness in performance," adding, "Usually by Take 17 the earnestness is gone." But half-joking aside, he said that collaboration "has to come from a place of deep knowledge." While he had no objections to having fun, he said, "When you go to your job, is it supposed to be fun, or are you supposed to get stuff done?"

He later called back and said he "adored the cast" of "Zodiac" and felt "lucky to have them all," but was "totally shocked" by Mr. Gyllenhaal's remark about reshoots.

Robert Downey Jr., impeccably cast as a crime reporter driven to drink, drugs and dissolution, called Mr. Fincher a disciplinarian and agreed that, as is often said, "he's always the smartest guy in the room." But Mr. Downey put this in perspective.

"Sometimes it's really hard because it might not feel collaborative, but ultimately filmmaking is a director's medium," he said. "I just decided, aside from several times I wanted to garrote him, that I was going to give him what he wanted. I think I'm a perfect person to work for him, because I understand gulags."

Mr. Ruffalo too survived some 70-take shots. "The way I see it is, you enter into someone else's world as an actor," he said. "You can put your expectations aside and have an experience that's new and pushes and changes you, or hold onto what you think it should be and have a stubborn, immovable journey that's filled with disappointment and anger."

He said Mr. Fincher was equally demanding of everyone — executives, actors, himself. "He knows he's taking a stab at eternity," Mr. Ruffalo said. "He knows that this will outlive him. And he's not going to settle for anything other than satisfaction, deep satisfaction. Somewhere along the line he said, 'I will not settle for less.' "

[crippled_avenger]

Zodiac
By TODD MCCARTHY


A Paramount (in N. America), Warner Bros. (international) release and presentation of a Phoenix Pictures production. Produced by Mike Medavoy, Arnold W. Messer, Bradley J. Fischer, James Vanderbilt, Cean Chaffin. Executive producer, Louis Phillips. Directed by David Fincher. Screenplay, James Vanderbilt, based on the book by Robert Graysmith.

Inspector David Toschi - Mark Ruffalo
Robert Graysmith - Jake Gyllenhaal
Paul Avery - Robert Downey Jr.
Inspector William
Armstrong - Anthony Edwards
Melvin Belli - Brian Cox
Bob Vaughn - Charles Fleischer
Mel Nicolai - Zack Grenier
Sherwood Morrill - Philip Baker Hall
Sgt. Jack Mulanax - Elias Koteas
Zodiac 4 - John Lacy
Ken Narlow - Donal Logue
Arthur Leigh Allen - John Carroll Lynch
Captain Marty Lee - Dermot Mulroney
Melanie - Chloe Sevigny
Al Hyman - Ed Setrakian
Templeton Peck - John Getz
Charles Thieriot - John Terry
Carol Fisher - Candy Clark
Duffy Jennings - Adam Goldberg
Officer George Bawart - James Le Gros

An obsession that cannot be satisfied erodes the souls of the central characters in "Zodiac," a mesmerizing account of the infamous, never-solved Bay Area serial killings as seen from the perspectives of several men who spent years trying to crack the case. Conveying an astonishing array of information across a long narrative arc while still maintaining dramatic rhythm and tension, this adaptation of Robert Graysmith's bestseller reps by far director David Fincher's most mature and accomplished work. It is decidedly not sensationalistic along the lines of "Seven," hardcore fans of which may be disappointed by new pic's methodical nature and unavoidable inconclusiveness. But discerning auds worldwide will find deep satisfaction, pointing to moderate but sustained B.O. given proper distrib nurturing.
From the exceptional coherence with which James Vanderbilt's script grapples with complex events and dozens of characters to the journalistic setting, procedural format, era in question and the very presence of David Shire as composer, the cinematic touchstone for "Zodiac" is clearly "All the President's Men."

And yet the feel of the new film is very different. Due to the extended timeframe, West Coast setting, working-class characters, preponderance of rock songs and, most decisively, Harris Savides' precise yet fluid HD camerawork, the pic possesses a kind of seedy dreaminess that most strongly recalls another indelible epic of '70s California, "Boogie Nights." Both films occupy that rarified high ground where audacious artistry and nervy commercial filmmaking occasionally converge.

Beginning with the startling July 4, 1969, shooting of two teenagers in a makeout parking lot, the pic jumps ahead to the moment a month later when the culprit sent portions of a cipher to three Bay Area newspapers and threatened to continue killing unless they were immediately published.

Of course, he went ahead anyway, attacking another amorous couple by a lake in Napa. Unblinkingly filmed, the daylight slashing is agonizing and bloody but is the last explicit sequence of its kind in the picture, which then almost entirely assumes the points of view of those who struggled in vain to nail the taunting, bedeviling psychopath.

Just as the locus of "President's Men" was the Washington Post, so the home base of "Zodiac" is a newsroom -- this time the San Francisco Chronicle's, a space where funkiness has won the battle with respectability and there's not a female reporter in sight.

Goateed crime reporter Paul Avery (Robert Downey Jr.), with the air of a dissolute dandy, takes on the case. Unofficially, so does the paper's bashful new cartoonist, Graysmith (Jake Gyllenhaal), who manages to deduce the meaning of the cipher and its reference to "The Most Dangerous Game," the short story and film about the hunting of mankind.

Once the the self-named Zodiac strikes in San Francisco proper, the city cops join the hunt, led by homicide Inspector Dave Toschi (Mark Ruffalo) and his partner, Inspector William Armstrong (Anthony Edwards).

Despite the fact the Zodiac provides hidden clues in his texts and leaves behind partial evidence at crime scenes, the cops make little headway. Much of the early going is devoted to Toschi, Avery and the self-appointed Graysmith trying to connect the dots while the public remains on edge.

As the investigation fans out, the cops' attention is drawn to an uncouth, hulking loner, Arthur Leigh Allen (John Carroll Lynch), who has a history of "touching" youngsters. Despite uncanny "coincidences" (Allen wears a Zodiac watch and is a "Most Dangerous Game" fan), no conclusive proof ties him to the crimes, so the search goes on.

And on. After several years, the trail has gone cold and those who have followed it are old before their time. Worst off is Avery, who's a physical wreck -- a victim of his addictions and obsessions. By the late '70s, Toschi's star has fallen; he's been moved out of homicide, his old partner Armstrong's earlier decision to quit having been proven prescient. Still, Toschi is intermittently willing to help the ever-enthusiastic Graysmith, who is now industriously retracing everyone's steps with the intention of writing a book about the case.

Graysmith's search leads him back to Allen, and one encounter the earnest fellow has with a former Allen associate is breathtakingly suspenseful. Graysmith's eventual conclusions may possess an element of wish fulfillment, but are about as convincing as circumstantial evidence will allow.

Throughout the film's 2½ hours, Fincher maintains the sort of locked-in, ultra-focused hold on his material he's displayed before, but with a touch that, if not exactly gentle, is less ferocious and overbearing. Due in part to the times at which certain scenes were shot, as well as to the limpid quality of the HD images ("Zodiac" is the latest big production shot with the Thomson Viper Filmstream Camera), a certain twilight, afternoon-into-darkest-night atmosphere dominates, appropriately enough given the characters' slow descent into the murky abyss.

There's no showing off with technique this time, no pandering to the public's baser instincts, just extremely disciplined filmmaking in which the camera is always in exactly the right place. Notably imaginative are the transitions and means of conveying the passage of time, marked at one point by the stop-frame construction of the landmark Transamerica Building.

Playing the author of the book on which the film is based, Gyllenhaal carries the burden of the large structure capably and lightly. Starting as an almost naive foil for Avery's urbane cynicism, Graysmith ultimately sustains his obsession longer than anyone, and with endurance comes reward, even if his complete immersion costs him his second wife (Chloe Sevigny).

Downey richly amplifies Avery's booze-and-drug-fueled glibness and, later, his descent into disease and disenchanted seclusion. Most resembling a young Columbo, Ruffalo has a number of choice moments, but the role seems oddly truncated; one doesn't really get the sense of a legendary cop who served as the inspiration for Steve McQueen's character in "Bullitt," Clint Eastwood's "Dirty Harry" (itself based on the Zodiac murders and referenced herein) and Michael Douglas' character in "The Streets of San Francisco."

Performances and casting are impeccable down to the smallest role. Brian Cox socks over his extended cameo as San Francisco's showboating celebrity lawyer Melvin Belli. Also making striking impressions are Charles Fleischer as a strange film buff acquaintance of the possible killer, Philip Baker Hall as an ostensibly reliable handwriting expert and, above all, Lynch as the unsettling prime suspect.

On top of everything else, "Zodiac" manages an almost unerringly accurate evocation of the workaday San Francisco of 35-40 years ago. Forget the distorted emphasis on hippies and flower-power that many such films indulge in; this is the city as it was experienced by most people who lived and worked there. For this, hats off to production designer Donald Graham Burt, costume designer Casey Storm and the hairstylists, among many others. The only inaccuracy catchable on one viewing: the too-early presence on the streets of diamond lanes, which were not introduced until the '70s.

Shire's subtle score, which comes increasingly into play as the action accelerates, effectively complements the double-soundtrack's worth of pop tunes headlined by Donovan's "Hurdy Gurdy Man," which hauntingly frames the picture.


Camera (Technicolor, widescreen, HD), Harris Savides; editor, Angus Wall; music, David Shire; music supervisors, George Drakoulias, Randall Poster; production designer, Donald Graham Burt; art director, Keith Cunningham; set designers, Lori Rowbotham Grant, Kevin Cross, Dawn Brown Manser, Jane Wuu; set decorator, Victor Zolfo; costume designer, Casey Storm; sound (Dolby Digital/DTS/SDDS), Drew Kunin; sound designer, Ren Klyce; supervising sound editors, Klyce, Richard Hymns; re-recording mixers, Michael Semanick, David Parker, Klyce; visual effects, Digital Domain, Matte World Digital, Mar Vista Ventures, Ollin Studio; visual effects supervisor, Eric Barba; stunt coordinator, Mickey Giacomazzi; assistant director, Mary Ellen Woods; casting, Laray Mayfield. Reviewed at Paramount studios, Los Angeles, Feb. 8, 2007. MPAA Rating: R. Running time: 156 MIN.