There’s more than one way to lose your life to a killer.

Genre: Crime, Drama, Thriller
Role: Melanie Graysmith
Director: David Fincher
Co-Stars: Jake Gyllenhaal, Robert Downey Jr., Mark Ruffalo, Anthony Edwards, Brian Cox, John Carroll Lynch, Elias Koteas, Clea DuVall
Release Date: U.S., March 2 2007 (theatrical)
MPAA Motion Picture Rating: R

• Overview
• Memorable Melanie Quotations
• Zodiac Movie Trivia
• Critical Reception
• Zodiac Online

More photos in our Zodiac gallery!

As a serial killer terrifies the San Fransisco Bay Area and taunts police with his ciphers and letters, investigators in four jurisdictions search for the murderer. The case eventually becomes an obsession for four men as their lives and careers are built and destroyed by the endless trail of clues. Based on the actual case files of one of the most intriguing unsolved crimes in the United States’ history.

Chloë Sevigny portrays Melanie Graysmith, the long-suffering wife of cartoonist Robert Graysmith (Gyllenhaal) who is forced to sit by and watch her husband become ever more obsessed with the Zodiac Killer. As Melanie helplessly watches her husband become dangerously involved with the case, she is eventually forced to make a decision between the safety of their family and her love for Robert.

“Is this some sleazy plan to get me to go home with you?”

“Are you kidding? This is the most interesting date I’ve ever had.”

“Then whose been calling our house in the middle of the night at least once a week? What’s it gonna take for you to be done with this?”

“Well, that’s too bad because we’re gonna talk about this.”

“When is it gonna be finished? When you catch him? When you arrest him?”

“Nobody has more Zodiac crap than you do.”

“Robert, it was just a date that didn’t end.”

• Zodiac is based on the real life case of the Zodiac Killer, a serial killer who operated in Northern California in the late 1960s and early 1970s. The Zodiac Killer coined the name “Zodiac” in a series of taunting letters sent to the local Bay Area press. These letters included four cryptograms (or ciphers), three of which have yet to be solved. The Zodiac murdered victims in Benicia, Vallejo, Lake Berryessa, and San Francisco between December 1968 and October 1969. Four men and three women between the ages of 16 and 29 were targeted. Numerous suspects have been named by law enforcement and amateur investigators but no conclusive evidence has surfaced and the identity of the killer remains unknown. In April 2004, the San Francisco Police Department marked the case “inactive”, yet re-opened the case at some point prior to March 2007. The case also remains open in the city of Vallejo as well as in Napa County and Solano County. The California Department of Justice has maintained an open case file on the Zodiac murders since 1969.

• Scenes with Dave Toschi and Robert Graysmith watching Dirty Harry were filmed inside the Mann National Theatre in Westwood, CA. The garish colors of the movie theater were not added by the art department; the very retro interiors of the theater had remained unchanged since 1969, when the National was first built. Interestingly, Zodiac played at the Mann National Theatre in March 2007; thus, moviegoers watched other moviegoers occupy their seats on the National’s trademark large screen. The theater has since been torn down.

• Robert Graysmith and Paul Avery were not actually friends. Their relationship was fictionalized for the film.

• The film was shot over the course of 110 days.

• The producers of Zodiac actually hired a private investigator to track down the real life Zodiac survivor, Mike Mageau.

• When George Bawart is showing Michael Mageau pictures to see if he can identify the Zodiac, the picture to the right of Arthur Leigh Allen (played by John Carroll Lynch), is Bob Stephenson, the actor who plays the Zodiac when he shoots Paul Stine.

• The Zodiac’s first murder on Lake Herman Rd. was excluded from the film on the basis that there was no surviving victim to corroborate the details. For the sake of accuracy, the crew decided to not include the Lake Herman killings and instead began with the July 4th crime, considered the Zodiac’s second act of murder.

• In order to save time, director David Fincher digitally added all the blood in the murder scenes.

• The real life Zodiac survivor, Bryan C. Hartnell, makes a cameo appearance in the film with his wife, at the police station.

Zodiac received a nationwide U.S. release in March 2007, followed by international releases in May and June. Reviews on the film have been generally positive and the film was nominated for multiple awards during the 2007-2008 awards season, even though its acting performances were mostly not in contention for any of the big awards. Chloë Sevigny’s supporting role was mostly not discussed by the critics, owing undoubtedly to the role being so small.

• Rating > Internet Movie Database: 7.8/10 (101,000 user votes counted)
• Rating > MetaCritic: 78/100 metascore, “Generally favorable reviews” (professional)
• Rating > Rotten Tomatoes: 89% positive reviews, “Fresh” (professional)

Extracts from professional reviews:

“In the past Fincher has poured on the atmospherics — you practically needed an umbrella and a flashlight to see Seven — and ramped up the shock value to provoke a reaction. But his work here speaks of the utmost concentration, patience and restraint. It is his most mature and coherent picture. [...] Fincher may not be what you would call an indulgent director with his actors, but he always casts strongly, and there isn’t a weak performance in the entire movie.”
- Tom Charity, CNN

“Fincher is an elegant stylist on top of everything else, and here he finds the right pace and style for a story about persistence in the face of evil. I am often fascinated by true crime books, partly because of the way they amass ominous details (the best I’ve read is Blood and Money, by Tommy Thompson), and Fincher understands that true crime is not the same genre as crime action. That he makes every character a distinct individual is proof of that; consider the attention given to Graysmith’s choice of mixed drink.”
- Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

“May everyone who plans on making Saw 12 watch the gut-wrenching murder sequences in Zodiac and appreciate the astonishing, unalloyed clarity of the filmmaking. These same young directors were presumably also weaned on Fincher’s Se7en, that chicly apocalyptic serial killer flick that birthed a generation of amoral and visionless imitators. With that movie in mind, people were remaking filthy horror classics of the 1970s to resemble the fashionable distress of Fincher’s thriller. [...] Zodiac is a kind of corrective remake of Se7en, a renunciation of that earlier movie’s psychotic nihilism. That rejection extends to a neat sight gag. Fincher gives us a shot of a cardboard cutout for Dirty Harry that mocks the personal abyss that catching Zodiac becomes. ‘He doesn’t break cases,’ it reads. ‘He smashes them.’ The irony is piquantly funny. The Zodiac case smashes just about every man who tries to break it.”
- Wesley Morris, The Boston Globe

Personal Thoughts

Sandra: Because I don’t own this movie on DVD, I often forget how good Zodiac actually is until I somehow happen to see it again. To begin with, the score in the film is genius. The piano, the violins… The music is teasing, haunting and critical in maintaining the film’s unique atmosphere. The cinematography is just as terrific, as is the cast, of whom Mark Ruffalo and Robert Downey Jr. deserve a particular mention. Although it is rather too long for a movie (and is therefore best watched when properly awake), Zodiac is definitely worth a look as an example of what crime thrillers can be, even today.

As Melanie, Chloë Sevigny delivers a solid performance, but it is a very small role, and as the concerned wife she mostly has uninteresting platitudes to say. Although the movie has often been quoted as Chloë’s first big mainstream production, I think fans will be disappointed with how little screen time she actually gets, understandable though it is in the context of the story.

Below are some Zodiac-related links that may be of interest to you.

• Zodiac official site
• Zodiac TFL-approved fanlisting
• Zodiac TFL-approved Melanie character fanlisting
• Zodiac on IMDb.com
• Zodiac on RottenTomatoes.com
• Zodiac on Wikipedia.org

• David Fincher on IMDb.com
• David Fincher on Wikipedia.org

• Clea DuVall on Clea DuVall Fan
• Jake Gyllenhaal on Jake Gyllenhaal Fan
• Mark Ruffalo on Ruffalo Central
• Robert Downey Jr. on Downey Unlimited