A mystery movie or novel.

The name of the zodiac

Mbth Zodiac (2007)

The director is david fincher of the Zodiac david fincher.

Screenwriter Screenwriter:

James Vanderbilt ... (screenplay)

Robert Graysmith ... (Book)

Starring:

Jake Gyllenhaal Jake Gyllenhaal

Robert Downey Jr. Robert Downey Jr.

Mark Ruffalo Mark Ruffalo

Anthony edwards anthony edwards

Genre: thriller/plot/crime

More Chinese titles:

Kill the zodiac/zodiac/mystery.

More foreign books:

Chronicles of past dynasties See PARALIPOMENA

Length:160min

Country/Region: USA

Dialogue language: English

Distribution company: Fox-Warner

Release date: March 2, 2007, USA

Official website: Paramount Pictures [USA]

Plot introduction:

David fincher's Zodiac in the style of Seven Deaths, adapted from Robert Graysmith's best-selling documentary Unlocking the Zodiac: The Identity Mystery of the American Devil. A mysterious criminal named "Black Boy of the Zodiac Killer" made a series of bloody cases in Los Angeles last century, making him one of the most terrible and elusive serial killers in American history.

San Francisco, shrouded in darkness, has always lacked self-confidence during the day, and the smell of blood has stirred up the hidden pain of panic and anxiety, which has entangled the citizens for 12 years. In the 1970s, a self-proclaimed "Zodiac Killer" went crazy, happily played a life-and-death game, killed a person, sent a letter, "kindly" left a clue to the police, and then watched an atypical chase that saw only the cat but not the mouse. Faced with such a strange and unruly fanatic, the dull police can't cope. However, the San Francisco Chronicle reporters Robert (Jake Gyllenhaal) and Paul (Robert Downey Jr.) saw the clues of the case. With the help of detective David (Mark Farrow) and partner Bill (anthony edwards), they have a double competition with the zodiac killer. ...

Comment in a word:

David fincher described a frightening psychological war perfectly, and his opponent was the smartest and most elusive serial murderer in American history.

-"Movie Symbol"

Fear and anxiety run through the whole story perfectly.

-Philadelphia Weekly

There is no doubt that this film will seriously hit the safety awareness of the audience, which is really unpleasant.

Newsweek

Behind the scenes production:

About the story.

The zodiac tells a true story, a chilling crime. The whole story stems from the revenge of a madman. No one knows his true identity, and his atrocities have never been punished by law. He named himself "Zodiac", and he was elusive and good at making puzzles. This series of murderers once put the whole United States in a panic, and they were an out-and-out demon. In the1960s and1970s, at least 65,438+03 people died at his hands, but according to his own account, there were 24 people ... The police confirmed that there were 8 murders related to him, but the exact number has always been a mystery. The only certainty is that this figure also includes the living.

The film, directed by david fincher, tells the story of a serial murderer wandering in San Francisco. He mocked the group by sending letters with codes. He claimed that his true identity was hidden in the password, but the password was not solved until the end. The behavior of the "Zodiac" attracted the attention of four men. In the process of tracing the murderer, they are not only awakened by another self, but also re-entered the soul construction of life, and are also destroyed by these endless clues.

Of these four people, Robert Graysmith is the most variable. This shy and introverted cartoonist contributes exclusively to the San Francisco News. But he resolutely followed the newspaper ace reporter Paul Avery to investigate the case of the zodiac killer in depth. Although he lacks Paul's contacts and news sensitivity, he has important insight and foresight, and even greater enthusiasm.

Paul Avery has a very special relationship with Dave Toscher, a famous and ambitious detective of the San Francisco Police Department, and his cautious partner william armstrong. How special this relationship is is unknown, but many crime news stories reported by Avery came from them ... and all the events began on an ordinary day-65438+1August 969. On this day, the editorial department of San Francisco News received a handwritten letter with a rough font, which contained many emails. Its arrival represented a bad omen and caused an uproar among editors: "Dear editor, this is a murder ..." It described several murders from1968 65438+February 20th-that day, David. The person who wrote this letter didn't know the names of these victims, but he accurately told some very detailed and clear details that only the police knew. Since then, he has been sending letters to the editorial department, claiming that every piece of paper has a password, and once it is cracked one by one, his true identity will be exposed. These letters are like one death declaration after another, and there is one or more murders behind each letter. He has become another serial murderer who enjoys playing with the police after Jack the Ripper.

The name "Zodiac" has become a terrible taboo. Although a couple living in Salinas cracked these passwords, Robert Graysmith, who has a strong interest in passwords, thinks the information they gave is incorrect. He solved the hidden meaning of the password, which involved a film "The Most Dangerous Game" by 1932. But what does this movie convey?

1On September 27th, 969, the "Zodiac Killer" disguised himself with a headscarf, a pistol and a dagger, and continued to commit crimes, killing a young couple who went to the lake for a picnic-Cecilia Ann Shepard and Brian Hartnell. A month later, on June 65438+1October 1 1, the Zodiac killer returned to San Francisco and shot a bullet into the back of the head of taxi driver Paul Lee Stein. Three days later, a letter brought even worse news. "Zodiac killer" said that the police would take him away that night, but before that, he would shoot a student of a school bus ... The problem is that he didn't say which school he would ambush, which embarrassed the San Francisco police department. The information revealed by the Zodiac killer in his letter made special agent Dave Tosher, william armstrong and journalist Paul Avery form a temporary alliance to solve the case. However, the Zodiac killer is always one step ahead. These three people not only lost themselves in the clues left by the zodiac, but also lost their reputation in the end. The only person left is Robert Graysmith, who has been a bystander in the whole incident.

About the film

Welcome to the nightmare created by director david fincher again ... Like many American children living in San Francisco in the last century, david fincher, who was only seven years old at that time, once lived in the nightmare of a mysterious invisible killer. People call him "the zodiac". David fincher recalled the scene at that time: "If you grew up here, fear will always pervade your childhood: What if he chose our school bus?" What if he shows up around us? Looking back at that time, my idea is really a bit dramatic, but children are children. I grew up in Marin, San Francisco. Now, I know that the place where the crime happened is far away from me, but when you were a primary school student, what you lacked was this kind of rational thinking. At that time, I only thought of one thing-he would appear in our school. I still remember the horror faces of the children when they talked about the killer. 1974, our family moved away, but I clearly remember that the name' Zodiac' has always accompanied my childhood memories. "

In the next 30 years, david fincher never dreamed that he would repeat his nightmare in this way-directing Zodiac Killer. By searching 1000 pages of records and evidence of the incident at that time, david fincher felt that his childhood memory was recovering little by little. He interviewed several policemen, the surviving victims and the families of the main suspects involved in the incident ... At that time, a primary school teacher was arrested, accused of being a pedophile and put in prison because of his abnormal preference for primary school students, but whether he was the "Zodiac" or not is still the case.

And david fincher himself wanted to know what ignited the enthusiasm of Robert Graysmith, who was only a cartoonist in San Francisco News at that time, and made him want to uncover the mystery of the murderer. Gray Smith wrote two best-selling novels, The Naked Zodiac, which not only recorded every detail at that time, but also recorded the investigation process of four people being tortured and painful, and the text was full of satire on human nature. David fincher described Gray Smith as follows: "He knew he was just a bystander in the whole story, but he always wanted to be a part of it, and he did. He devoted himself to the investigation as soon as he had time, because although he worked in a newspaper, he was not a reporter. But he never gave up his pursuit and was once very close to the truth. Strictly speaking, this film is completely based on the viewpoint given by Gray Smith, but we did our own investigation, including the official report of the police and the interview with the client ... However, the time has passed so long that even the memory of the client will inevitably be affected, so we got many different interpretations of the story. In case of doubt, we will take the police report as the benchmark. With regard to the story of the Chinese zodiac, many people stand up and say that some of Gray Smith's views are wrong and he is right. However, there are too many secrets to be solved in the event itself, so when dealing with the film, the truth is always uncertain, which is why we choose to tell this story through Gray Smith's eyes. My purpose is relatively simple, as long as I can grasp the' truth' expressed in the two novels. "

Trivia:

Screenwriter Shane Salerno bought the copyright of Robert Graysmith's novel Zodiac at the age of 19, studied the story with Graysmith for many years, and then sold the script to Touchstone Film Company, a subsidiary of Disney, and got a seven-figure reward. Although the screenwriter of this film does not include Sean Salerno, he did write many versions of the script for this story about the real serial killer in San Francisco.

Actor and producer Anthony gonul is a classmate of a victim who died at the hands of the San Francisco Zodiac killer.

In this film, the role of Linda Flynn was originally played by bijou phillips, but later she had to be remade, and Philip's schedule could not be adjusted, so she had to be remade by clea duvall.

Director david fincher initially asked Gary Oldman to play detective Dave Tosher, but because Odeman wanted to continue playing Sirius in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, he had to give up Zodiac.

David fincher's strict requirements for performance made Jake Gyllenhaal, one of the leading actors, suffer a lot. On the first day of shooting, the first scene was ng 67 times.

Wonderful dialogue

The 7th letter (1 1 9th, 1969):… I won't announce the murders I committed to anyone, they will look like ordinary robberies, angry killings and some false accidents, and so on …

The seventh letter (1969165438+1October 9): ... When I carried out my murder plan, I would never tell anyone that some of their deaths looked like ordinary robberies, others were due to anger and some false accidents ... and so on.

Dave Toki: I've been thinking. ...

Paul Avery: Oh, God, help us.

Dave Tosher: I've been thinking. ...

Paul Avery: God, help us.

But in fact, the zodiac does exist, and it seems to reappear on June 2 1 2008.

A murder was found in a motel in Fayetteville, North Carolina, USA. It is said that the Zodiac killer did it. From the late 1960s to the early 1970s, there were more than 20 serial killings of "Zodiac Killers" in San Francisco, and at least 30 people were killed. More than 1 month after the second case, three local newspapers in San Francisco received mysterious letters, and the senders claimed responsibility for these cases.