Zodiac
Director: David Fincher
Year Released: 2007
Rating: 2.5
Madly obsessed newspaper cartoonist (Jake Gyllenhaal, who's everywhere these days) becomes inexplicably driven to solving the Zodiac murders in San Francisco; like real life, he never solves the crime and neither does the movie. Perhaps it's just me, but there seems to be a lack of tension or drama in the picture, and any potential fascination in these individuals seeps out of the movie the longer it goes on (like a tire with a puncture wound) to the point where it ends with a whimper instead of a bang (I began to, against the movie's wishes, identify with the neglected Chloe Sevigny character). I'm going to assume the 'point' is about mankind's drive towards solving the seemingly unsolvable, but this thesis is not enough to drive an entire picture along. Robert Downey Jr.'s witty reporter character is a bright spot - even though he belongs in another movie - and when he disappears, so does any and all spark.
