It all began since his directorial debut --- "Alien 3", which is still ignored and even rejected by Fincher himself now due to the studio's restraint on his creative freedom at that time. However, his visual wizardry was already evident in the movie. For example, unlike its prequels, it scared the hell out of you without showing you much of the Alien itself; rather he inventively used the POV shot from the Alien itself for the scenes of preying and devouring of its victims. Also, towards the end, the self sacrifice of Sigourney Weaver by plunging down in the posture of a "cross" with the baby alien in her belly has obvious biblical reference as well.
After that, his second feature "Se7en" became an instant hit (my favourite as well) and the rest is history.
Apart from his wonderful story-telling technique and extraordinary vision, I love his skillful discussion of the social phenomenon and examinations of the human values/flaws within his movies (e.g. various common sins committed daily in our community as described in "Se7en", global capitalism and materialism in "Fight Club", mid-life crisis and existentialism in "The Game", feminism and single-parenthood in Panic Room, etc...). He can preach with humour, provoke thinking through entertainment, and inspire without pulling a strict face. I mostly admire him for this.
However, regardless of his diversity on subjects/genres, all of his movies so far are about crimes and violence, and there are palpable sense of isolation/despair/emptiness of the people in his every movie. And Fincher seems having an affinity for the philosophy about the need of Men for sufferings and adversities in order to understand the full meaning of life. This is the recurring theme in all his outputs up till now, his latest one, the Zodiac.
In preparing for the movie "Zodiac", I have read the book "Zodiac" written by Robert Graysmith (Jake Gyllenhaal's character) , from which the movie largely based on. And my reading of the 300-page book proved to be quite rewarding, for it helps me to follow the complex story lines of the movie, and most importantly, to realise the director's views and messages intended.
During my reading, I had a particular feel and perception of the story, and therefore an expectation of how the film would look like. However, Fincher totally surprised me in every way. It has nothing in common with his earlier work "Se7en". He intentionally downplayed the murder scenes, totally avoiding the perspectives from the serial killer and even minimising his on-screen time and dialogues, skipping the gory crime scenes and ignoring the detailed investigations on site. The killer and his cruel acts were very trivialized to the degree that the 2 important murders were even scrammed into the short pre-credit prologue!
The story officially kicks off with the first Zodiac letter arriving at the San Francisco Chronicle, and introduces us to the two leads---top crime reporter Paul Avery (played wonderfully by Robert Downey Jr., or was he just being himself??) and small-potato political cartoonist Robert Graysmith. And later in the murder case of cab driver Paul Stine, we meet the other two major characters---inspector Bill Armstrong (played by Anthony Edwards of "ER" fame) and famous inspector David Toschi (marvelously portrayed by Mark Ruffalo). And Fincher invested lots of effort and time in concentrating on stories of these 4 different real people whose lives were immensely changed by Zodiac the serial killer.
Through compare and contrast with the book, I found that the movie was very fast-paced (even difficult to follow for people without some background knowledge of it), with significant trimming down of many facts and myths surrounding the murder cases and Zodiac's many letters and codes (giving only essential information to the audience on the need-to-know basis); while instead it expanded the dimensions for the four lead characters, especially the author himself (actually he did not mention anything about his own life in the book).
In my opinion, the movie stressed and concentrated on three key issues---the chaotic coordination between the Police jurisdictional districts; the power of the mass media; and obviously the obsession.
The movie successfully revealed in one vivid scene where inspector Armstrong was trying to communicate through phone but in vain with other Police districts where the other murders by the same killer took place. The cooperation, if any, was very chaotic and diplomatic rather than pragmatic or effective. This, together with the fact that the Police had ignored a source of information which was later gathered by reporter Avery to uncover the unknown murder linked to Zodiac, gives the audience the feeling that the killer escaped through those loop-holes in the system of law enforcement. Fincher once again examined and criticized this notorious yet popular culture of the Government.
Also, most of the story took place in the Newspaper office, in the television studio, or told through the TV screens and the newspaper headlines, rather than in the Police Department. This is quite weird for a crime story but feasible here because Zodiac enjoyed seeking attention by contact with the mass media. I think to a certain degree this approach may even be intentional: to emphasize the mass media's part in the Zodiac cases since things got blown out of proportion by it, which even became the tool for the killer, to confuse the Police (like exaggerating the number of his victims by taking credit for other murders he saw reported on the papers) and scare the public (like the school-bus panic).
And for the Paul Avery discovery, the media even released such a key information to the public before the Police knowing it! The heated argument between Avery and Toschi in one scene more or less sums up such a symbiotic relationship between the Police and the media. Now, 30 years later, the mass media is still growing stronger, and exerting its influence everywhere, including politics.
Moreover, this movie is explicitly full of the recurring themes of personal obsessions. By definition, obsession means the recurrent and persistent idea or thought regardless of one's attempt to ignore or inhibit it. It may lead to compulsion, which refers to the behaviour driven by such an obsessive thought. The best pathological example is the Zodiac, who was obsessed with the idea of killing and could not control his murdering impulse. However, interestingly, almost all of the main characters in the movie have their different obsessions (e.g. Avery obsessed with risky lifestyle and later heavily with alcohol when he no longer had the job; Toschi obsessed with fame which almost cost his job when he was questioned of producing the last fake Zodiac letter; Lawyer Belli obsessed with publicity, fame and fortune; Graysmith obsessed with the identity of the Zodiac and lost his family and job because of that).
Smartly, Fincher balanced it a bit by using Armstrong, who quitted the job of homicide investigation so to enjoy his family life and "eating sushi". In one short scene, we got the glimpse of him walking away from a very lonely and tired Toschi at the car, and into the warmly lit porch of his house with his wife. The resulting contrast is overwhelming and inspiring. I think as an obsessive film maker himself, in this movie, Fincher tries to tell us the big cost of obsession, and the importance of knowing when to stop.
All in all, I regard this movie the first pure drama by Fincher. He deliberately restrained his usual visual styles this time with much subtlety instead. And this is why it would bore and fail so many people/fans if a thriller like "Se7en" was expected. The production overall is very authentic and realistic to every detail, from the period clothings, cars and sets for the '70s San Francisco (CGI was employed to rebuild the streets and buildings during that time), to the newspaper clippings and Zodiac's handwritings or other evidence. Fincher was trying to make a fluent chronological documentary-like drama faithful to that part of history as much as possible. He is a well-known perfectionist (he could ask the actors for seventy takes for a single scene just to get the effect he desires). Although he tried not to glorify the Zodiac killer and even trivialize his acts in the movie (different actors were used to play Zodiac for each of the murder scenes) so as not to fulfill his arrogant wish expressed in his last letter to the Police, with Fincher's careful planning beforehand, meticulous execution on set, and a change of style this time, on second thought, isn't there some similarities between the Zodiac and David Fincher himself?!?
