So in the end I saw this. Overall it was very good, incredibly detailed and long. Fincher goes to great lengths to map out each crime, the characters and basically every shot. This on the one hand works excellently but on the other hand it means by half way through you're so completely lost with all the details being thrown at you you're somewhat confused.
This is probably the point as it's clear the cops, journalists and comic artist barely have a clue how the Zodiac is getting away with things. It's unlikely he'd get away with it today but 40 odd years forensics weren't half as good.
Fincher decided to give us pretty much the entire case in a 2.5 hour period so the film spans from 1967 right up to 1991. That would work great in a book but IMO in a film it's a mistake. The film simply has too much detail, which is weird as I'm normally saying a film doesn't have enough. It does also mean parts of Zodiac go into so much detail but to catch up we constantly jump forward, sometimes hours, sometimes years.
Right at the end we're even given 3 very detailed screens of text to read, which of course you read quickly and can't take it in. I reckon I got the gist of what was going on but how they came to working out what he did, well I was lost. I got the central concept but the details huh???
Why was he shit scarred in that old guys house too? Who on earth was he?
It's definitely a film you need to see at least twice to take it all in. Don't go in half asleep as you'll have no chance
. Like I said overall it's very good but has simply far too much detail for a 2.5 hour running time. Personally I rated Seven and Fight Club higher, I even rate Panic Room higher.Overall I'd give it a solid 7 out of 10.
