Zodiac - Director's Cut [Blu-ray] [2007] [Region Free]

A simply fantastic film and the HD transfer is demo worthy the directors cut adds to the film without making it drag. You simply can't get much more classy than this film and disc, the extras are fantastic too but the one stand out extra has to be the "this is the zodiac speaking" documentry this runs at about 90 mins and features interviews with all the surviving people from the real zodiac case and some great crime scene photos and archive footage. A film you'll never forget, within minutes of watching it you'll be on the internet trying to solve the case yourself and straight back to amazon to buy the books. I can not recommend it enough a real 5 star effort

David Fincher's brave take on Robert Graysmith's book gets to grip with the obsessive complexity of the source, evoking its spirit through compelling analysis of the minutiae of the case. Those expecting a thrilling cat and mouse chase in the mold of Seven may be disappointed, but comparisons to Fincher's earlier classic are unfair. 'Zodiac' is as much about the mood of 1960s and 70s California as about the mystery itself, about the dying idealism of the principle characters and their belief in being able to solve the case. Like The Transamerica Pyramid, which we see in the process of construction, the Zodiac case goes to the heart of San Francisco's modern history. The architecture, clothing and technology of the period are much more than background in a film about police procedure. Progress is hampered by juristictional boundaries, lack of cooperation, and the absence of 'telefax'. Anthony Edward's stoic cop makes a succession of phone calls at one stage to various regional police departments to collect evidence, a lumbersome process reminding us of a world pre-internet and email. With is focus on procedure and character, Zodiac belongs to a tradition of films that could be said to have begun in the 1970s with Alan J Pakula's All the President's Men and The Parallax View, and continued more recently with Michael Mann's The Insider.

This could have been dull and plodding, but the director and cast manage to sustain interest and tension throughout. Very true to the facts - some would say constrained by them - the film tells the murders as they happened, refusing to sensationalise them. In some instances, this shows the killer to be quite clumsy and opportunist, not the dark genius that you might imagine. The film is not in awe of the killer's stealth, but shows how legal infrastructure and human failure conspired to prevent his capture. It is also a timely reminder how the oxygen of publicity both inspires murder and inhibits our ability to solve it.

Despite brilliant acting throughout, there are a couple of niggles in the characterisation that handicap this film slightly. Jake Gyllenhall's Robert Graysmith is not really relevant as a character until about half way through, and the film misses some fleshing out of his character to lend verisimility to his obsessive personality. We see his descent and near unravelling in the riddles of the case, but before we can be convinced of some inherant character trait that might explain his fixation. Likewise, Robert Downey Jnr - who is remarkably not irritating as the reporter Paul Avery - becomes fairly peripheral in this film. We are told of his extraordinary knowledge of the case, and we see his subsequent descent into alcaholism, but are we to assume the two are connected? His interest in the case is unclear - is it merely professional, or is it the root cause of his self-destruction? Some fleshing out here would have helped, despite the film already running into two and a half hours. The length has been criticised, but in my opinion the film stays engaging and tense until the end. Great stuff.

The long-delayed Director's Cut of David Fincher's "Zodiac" is finally with us and there is good news and bad news; the bad news is that the new scenes barely amount to five extra minutes in a 2 1/2 hour movie and some of the additional scenes are so brief you'll hardly notice them. Now to the good news; don't be put off by the very short new scenes that have been added, the documentaries and commentaries in this 2-disc set more than make up for it. On the DVD cover, the blurb says that the documentaries are "exhaustive" and, for once, the finished product lives up to the hype.

There is a feature-length documentary about the crimes themselves featuring fascinating, detailed interviews with the surviving victims of the Zodiac killer and the real detectives who worked the case (they look directly into camera as they recall the horrors of Zodiac's rampage and it pulls you into the story, Lake Berryessa victim Bryan Hartnell is unrecognisable now). You find out incredible details about how some detectives neglected to put crucial information in their reports and you hear officers openly contradicting one another about what happened. Essential viewing.

A second documentary is about the prime suspect in the case, it's called: "His Name Was Arthur Leigh Allen." Even if Allen wasn't the Zodiac, he was one very sick puppy indeed. A quite terrifying individual. Again, this is worth a look. See it and make up your own mind about Allen's guilt or innocence.

There is also an in-depth "Making Of" documentary which details David Fincher's exhausting shooting style (Watch in amazement as he makes Jake Gyllenhaal do 38 takes of dropping a book on a car seat until he is satisfied. Stanley Kubrick would be proud of Fincher!)

The commentaries are also excellent. There is one with David Fincher himself and a second with "L.A. Confidential" writer James Ellroy, Robert Downey Jr, Jake Gyllenhaal and the writer and producer. They are, again, full of even more detail you didn't know before.

There are also some deleted scenes which are interesting.

Zodiac in any cut is a superb movie. If you know a fan of the film or someone who has an interest in the Zodiac case, this would make an ideal Christmas present for them.