(Chris&Kenny-Gras Rating: 2 Tubs / No Butter Popcorn)
By now most people already know enough about the story that "Zodiac" is based on so I won't go into the details of what is without a doubt not an easy story to tackle as it takes takes place over many years and there is no neatly tied ending. Since I myself, personally have lived through two horrific serial killer eras, I was hooked and wanted to see what a talented director like David Fincher would do with it.
I saw the movie yesterday and could not have been more disappointed and not for the reasons that most people would think as I was not bothered by the lack of "closure" nor the running time of the film as some films require a longer run time than others to tell their stories, but this one simply fails to entertain... period!
The starting culprit is a script that is simply a mess. It is very unfocused, characters come and go without rhyme or reason, and rarely achieves the level of suspense that it should have generated.
One could argue that the script reflects exactly what it was trying to do, which could be to put you in the mindset of those involved and how nothing seemed to jell. While there may be artistic merit in the thesis, it fails as a movie must find a way to entertain even telling this frustrating tale.
I was especially bored by the detectives'/writers' home scenes as they seem cliched (husband and wife begin to drift apart because of his 'obsession" with the killer, parent ignoring family, etc.) I do applaud the director for getting the 1970's "look" without going overboard, and delivers with some interesting visuals, unfortunately, this isn't enough to save the film from being simply a big bore.
It would have been such if it had been 90 minutes long so again it's not about the running time. The performances are good across the board, especially of the actor playing the main suspect and Mark Ruffalo, once you can put aside that he looks a little too much like 'Columbo' is his early scenes.
Jake Gyllenhall (best known for Chris' favorite movie, "Brokeback Mountain") does an OK job but he seems to be playing a retard who gets upset if they think he's retard...get it? and Anthony Edwards does not really bring anything special to the role (He does have two camps...people who remember him from "ER" and those of us who remember him as Gilbert in "Revenge of the Nerds"....some people just can't escape their past).
Robert Downey Jr. (who is one of my favorite actors since the 80's...remember him in "Back To School" with the great Rodney Dangerfield and not as a regular on SNL?) manges to create some presence to his role, but not nearly enough to keep you interested in him. He's a go-getter, a great reporter, a scumbag, a drunk, a has-been and by the time his final scene comes out , you don't care.
There are so many alleged horror/suspense movies being released now and they are all making all sorts of money as they appear to be upping the ante on the old "Friday the 13th" "Nightmare on Elmstreet" movies. This movie, is not the adult suspense thriller that it is being marketed as.
The movie gets some things right, like the "look" of San Fransisco in the 1970s, and there are moments when you are really hoping that the movie will take off. When I compare this movie to 1995's Summer of Sam, I find myself rooting for this film since I think that 'Sam" was so terrible. On a personal note, My family & I lived through the terror of 1977 when David Berkowitz was killing people in NY and it struck close to home, but Spike Lee couldn't get it right either.
Now, when they make a movie about the 2002 D.C. Sniper (the other serial killer I lived through and was too close for comfort) They might make it so that you feel the "dread" of every moment until the end when finally justice prevails and you leave with a feeling of closure. Still though, one has to remember that unlike Berkowitz and Muhammad & Malvo....
The Zodiac killer has never been caught...
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