best david fincher, dudes

i'm goin zodiac, dudes

z-z-z-zodiac

thanking you for bringing Barry Sobel reference heat at 3 am!

that's why I'm here

Only ones I actively don't like are Alien³ and Panic Room, but I shouldn't say that because it sounds like I don't favor films with female leads. But they suck, truth.

fight club obv

Zodiac very obv

Alien³ is really underrated. Charles Dutton, Charles Dance, and Pete Postlethwaite... what's not to like?

don't get zodiac. <3 fight club.

As far as actual best... he's done more sophisticated work but Se7en launched Spacey, didn't kill the Black Guy or the Cop About To Retire and changed the course of Hollywood. Not for the better, true, but still.

Fight Club has moments but fails due to horrible horrible final ten minutes.

rogermexico otm about Fight Club. Voted for Zodiac, exciting movie (quite spooky) and a nice ensemble cast. Se7en is pretty good too.

xpost

Another for Zodiac.

I love ilxors because they're some of the few ppl who wouldn't walk Fight Club in a poll like this.

btw i voted for fight club because i thought it was fincheriest. i think bb is actually better, and that opinion kinda surprises me

I saw BB a couple days ago and I thought it totally sucked. Is that Mary-Alice "some people dance" bit in the story? Cos its super dodge. Also, I was taken to this on the pretense that it was an hour and a half long. The last time that shit happened to me was meet joe black, fucking brad pitt.

Alien 3 is unfairly shit upon.

tbh, I didn't really like Aliens either.

1999-2007: fave film was fight club
2009-date: fave film is zodiac

we don't talk about the 'lost years'

7

The Game is underrated. Apart from the building fall bit. Haven't seen Zodiac or Panic Room...

Hmmm. This is tricky. I adored Fight Club when I was 20, but it's very... the second half is pretty flat, and the last ten minutes is pretty awful. Watched the Norton Hulk the other day and that struck me as just a Fight Club rip...

I quite like Alien3 although I've not seen it in years. It got a hard deal. Zodiac is pretty wicked and I really like it.

But...

I think I have to go for Se7en.

im a signed-up fincher stan but i basically feel he got good with 'the game'. 'se7en' has a lot going for it, but it is unremittingly conservative and basically morgan freeman gets on my tits. (i don't think that all the 'it's easier to beat a child than to raise it' stuff is very fincher, whereas it does chime with the hardcore christian conservative message of 'bruce almighty' and its sequel, whatever that was called.)

http://pets.onas.ru/cats_fighting.jpg
http://www.illusionsdanceclub.com/files/Dance_floor_1.jpg

Haven't seen Button yet, but nothing I've heard makes me think it's going to overtake Zodiac in my heart.

One for the vastly underrated "The Game," which probably didn't wow me as much as FC when I first saw it but which has aged better in my memory.

Zodiac - the only one in which the art direction means something.

The "Express Yourself" video still his best, dudes.

this is gonna sound like some challop shit but i dont understand how a smart person like enrq could ever be impressed by fight club

shit is funny.

i thought it was pretty goddamn lame but that was probly cuz there was a lotta frontin burt_stanton type dudes who wouldnt stfu reppin it

points in favour

- was in college
- saw it before any of the publicity (film companies don't usually show films to student reviewers before release: fox had their demographic heads in a swivel with this rly)
- and thus before any of the stantons jumped on
- the first time was the best time, and totally out of the blue, had no idea what it was going to be other than basic 'men hitting each other' concept
- still think it's funny as balls, srsly
- still repping for amazingness of it as sheer technical feat: walking through the ikea catalogue, the montage that ends with the plane crashing into him...
- it's not some dumbshit 'omg corporations!' thing, i've realized, though that's what i got from it when i was 19 lol.

what is it?

lots of violence and fun stuff dude

do you rewatch it much?

I don't rewatch much of anything that isn't a slasher movie, so no

sorry, that was to nrq. staggered he likes FC.

really hard to separate out fight club as movie from fight club as signifier of reactionary political naivety at least here in the states

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+
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tbh i think it's kind of a secretly conservative film, not in a social-conservative way like 'se7en' though. and it doesn't resolve anything; despite the ending, it *is* still saying fuk u corporate america to an extent. it's just that that's what seemed most salient then, whereas now i do think it has a lot in common with zodiac and ccbb, which have nothing to do with any of that stuff.

tbh i think it's about things that will sound like lame philosophical generalizations unless they're somehow forged into thrilling and innovative screen art!

this is a tautological cop-out move, but to further would take me into jaggerstan territory.

but think it's fair to say there is a lot going on in the film, and i now see why a lot of older critics preferred the first half of it -- so much is about the same kinds of intimations of mortality you get in zodiac and ccbb -- but the last hour is still some dynamite filmmaking and HBC is rocking the shit.

really hard to separate out fight club as movie from fight club as signifier of reactionary political naivety at least here in the states

― max, Sunday, February 15, 2009 4:37 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

a little bit here too.

caek -- last time i saw it all the way through was three years ago, i think, and even that was probably with commentary.

+ i wrote a whole thing last year about how it invented the 'frat pack', but possibly without rewatching. (eg 'old school' is a comedy version of 'fight club'.)

I liked FC when it came out, but the OMG office drone monologing and fake Big Beat soundtrack (Dust Brothers lol) and CGI closeups like whatever TV cop show that I don't watch does, have def not aged well. Also I am not 20 anymore. The Game rly holds up tho.

(it's kind of an absolute fact that shit from ten years ago is always the least fashionable shit. i generally disregard that, though that will change when 'ten years ago' means 'the 2000s', which sucked imho.)

Fight Club is the only funny satire made by Hollywood since Bulworth. also, Edward Norton never better (esp given his inability to pick a script since).

Se7en edges it for me.

Fincher haaaaaaates Alien3 (no creative control).

Morbius, I'm trying to fathom you finding anything to laugh about in Bulworth -- is it Warren Beatty eating KFC?

I can understand not thinking Panic Room is the best -- it isn't -- but why the hate for it? Seems like a nice taut little thriller to me, nothing more, nothing less. Good, crafty work for hire with some clever Fincherian camera work and design. Jared Leto gets half his face burned off then gets shot in the head by Dwight Yoakam. What's to hate?

best part of panic room is the opening credits imo

i like PR, not my favorite but i threw it a pity vote.

i love most of these, but fight club takes it, mostly because rewatching it and realizing how effectively fincher is actually satirizing the reaction i had to it when i was 19 (and i think hes really aware of how much "yeeeaaahhhh smash the state i want someone to hit me in the face" young alternadudes are going to respond with) is kind of an awesome and amazing feat.

Can't remember who, but I remember one critic noting that Fight Club is far less serious than its partisans would indicate, and (unlike them) knows that the entire thing is way ridiculous.

the main thing I remember about Panic Room is all that prominently placed Evian water

opening credits of panic room are some of the best opening credits ever imo

brodiac

panic room... thats a movie that should have been way better.

that film is kind of the whole crux of david fincher, which is this extreme formal control pitched against chaos. and in that film the two come together in the worst way. it was planned out to within an inch of its life... and then the lead actress drops out and the new one is shorter, and gets pregnant, fucking up the plan. and then the dp quits. and then 9/11 means they have to re-shoot the ending. and the whole film is about the panic room being the most dangerous place of all. A STORY WITH A MORAL.

this is zodiac but I really, really liked Panic Room a lot, I think it's the only one of any of these that I've seen three times, people who hate it are crazy.

oh wait the Game, I overlooked that. I've seen that more. That edges Zodiac for me but only very slightly.

that film is kind of the whole crux of david fincher, which is this extreme formal control pitched against chaos. and in that film the two come together in the worst way. it was planned out to within an inch of its life... and then the lead actress drops out and the new one is shorter, and gets pregnant, fucking up the plan. and then the dp quits. and then 9/11 means they have to re-shoot the ending. and the whole film is about the panic room being the most dangerous place of all. A STORY WITH A MORAL.

― ^^ one of enriques sincere posts (special guest stars mark bronson), Sunday, February 15, 2009 5:16 PM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

script just sucked imo

yeah, basically. it's one of those movies that's great except for when you actually have to watch it.

Zodiac by a really wide margin

there were some holes in the plot, and yeah it just should have been better basically.

xp

what DO i give you, the crotch or the butt?

also does ILE think there are just 8 fucking filmmakers in the whole fucking world?

dude... let it go

FC is really masterful in my opinion....yes i agree tho it's in an "awkward" phase with some dated aspects, but that will pass most likely.

but as a movie that seriously entertains the appeal, and then the danger, of reactionary (or fascist) politics, it's simply great. and it's funny.

Zodiac, however, while less of a cultural phenom, is brilliant and rich and deep. for me, at least. but then i read almost the whole movie to be about epistemology.

Fight Club is a splendid comedy, a balling good time, and a truly bog-standard think-piece...I don't think it was intended any other way, and I love it

also does ILE think there are just 8 fucking filmmakers in the whole fucking world?

― Dr Morbius, Sunday, February 15, 2009 7:09 PM (10 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

If only there was a message board where people who are familiar with more than 8 filmmakers, perhaps people who love film, could congregate.

it could be called "they love film"

Voted Se7en, just a little over FC. Beautifully upsetting little potboiler, looks great.

surprised by how great zodiac was because i fucking despise se7en.

also does ILE think there are just 8 fucking filmmakers in the whole fucking world?

― Dr Morbius, Sunday, February 15, 2009 2:09 PM (33 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

ayo ILX what's your bombest jacques rivette joint? anyone who says scènes de la vie parallèle: 3: noroît (une vengeance) is a fucking RETARD imo

i am admiring the loveliness of morbz and enrq a.) agreeing on fight club and b.) actually being right. some kind hundred-year flood mark there.

still voted zodiac.

Fincher haaaaaaates Alien3 (no creative control).

He had creative control over the photography, seems like -- it LOOKS fantastic. Needed a long series of rewrites before it became a movie, though. That may be what he means.

script just sucked imo

To me Fincher always felt like the sort of director who's technically very talented, but who stands or falls on the strength of the scripts he chooses... I don't think he's ever written the script for any of his films himself. And I'm not saying only those people who write their own scripts can be great directors, but Fincher doesn't seem to be like Kubrick or Hitchcock, i.e. someone who could get great things out of any source material whatsoever.

well, hitchcock certainly couldn't do that.

And Kubrick only because he did have creative control. But Fincher ain't no Kubrick.

well, hitchcock certainly couldn't do that.

Okay, maybe I was exaggerating a bit, but Hitchcock certainly was better than Fincher in making not-so-brilliant source material shine due to his directorial skills.

fight club. se7en was fun, but doesn't seem particularly remarkable in retrospect. more influential than great. zodiac left me cold, though i expect it will take this in a landslide. none of the rest really work. agree that fincher is an impressive technical/visual craftsman but a terribly boring director

hard to compare. people made more films back then. fincher has made seven films in 17 years. in that period hitchcock made... a shit-ton more. he made his first seven films within three years of his debut. but few of his films were as marked at that stage as fincher's... it's just an unrealistic comparison.

the worst hitchcock is definitely a lot worse than the worst fincher.

xpost

Benjamin Button looked awesome, fwiw

To me Fincher always felt like the sort of director who's technically very talented, but who stands or falls on the strength of the scripts he chooses... I don't think he's ever written the script for any of his films himself. And I'm not saying only those people who write their own scripts can be great directors, but Fincher doesn't seem to be like Kubrick or Hitchcock, i.e. someone who could get great things out of any source material whatsoever.

― Tuomas, Sunday, February 15, 2009 10:06 PM (23 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

this is rong. name me a great movie by either of those directors that had a terrible script.

directors don't have write the scripts themselves but they have to know when they don't work and send them back.

^ or they have to make the terrible kinda work in their favor, somehow. something fincher seems completely unable to do.

or they have to make the terrible kinda work in their favor

probably need to give examples there, guy.

Kubrick and Hitchcock have made plenty of terrible films each wtf.

Kubrick's had some movies that weren't amazing, but never made something TERRIBLE, come on.

it helps that dude made like 9 movies total in 40 years or something

i think "directors who have never made a TERRIBLE movie" might be a nice thread idea

i dunno the script in Seven aint so great and but Fincher (and i suppose the art director and cinematographer) sort of make that movie memorable, such as it is. (for me anyway...)

this is rong. name me a great movie by either of those directors that had a terrible script.

directors don't have write the scripts themselves but they have to know when they don't work and send them back.

Well, I wasn't saying even Hitchcock could've saved a terrible script, or that he never made a bad movie, only that he was better at making mediocre scripts into good movies. I think movies like Rope or Dial M for Murder or The Lady Vanishes are all great, despite having not-so-brilliant scripts, because of Hitchcock's directorial skill.

and i have never seen a Hitchcock that was terrible (ie, totally devoid of interest) but i dont doubt a few exist. I dont think there are any Kubrick movies that dont have some value or fascination for me. Even clockwork, which i think was a failure ultimately.

You want a scary Halloween? Watch The Paradine Case or I Confess.

suspicion, spellbound, downhill -- all abject. ideas of what a good script is vary. most people rate 'the lady vanishes'.

oh i have avoided those this far thankfully....suspicion is pretty good tho imo.

i think this idea of Fincher (or any director) being "technically" talented but somehow, I guess, not aesthetically or creatively talented is kind of a complicated and problematic notion, but i dont really know how to approach it.

approach it by saying it's bs.

hahaha...yeah i guess that's part of what i was thinking!

puts me in mind of arguments about spielberg....

Spellbound is not totally "abject", it has some great scenes: the Dali dream sequences, the milk in the bottle, the slide down the handrail, the first-person view of the gun... I think it's a perfect example of Hitchcock getting some great things (though not a great movie) out of a not-so-good script.

i think this idea of Fincher (or any director) being "technically" talented but somehow, I guess, not aesthetically or creatively talented is kind of a complicated and problematic notion, but i dont really know how to approach it.

That's not what I said though. I do think he is creatively talent, and all of his films have some aesthetically brilliant bits, but they're not just enought to save them.

"they're just not enough to save them"

i had a hard time choosing between Zodiac and Fight Club, but in the end i chose Zodiac because i think it's just a more mature, patient, and universally appealing movie. i think it will stand the test of time much better than FC does.

i don't get out much, but does anyone think the zodiac preference detectable in this thread so far is indicative of anything broader than ilx's habitual fine judgement?

it did not set the box office on fire and a fair number of my acquaintances don't have much of an idea what it is. you probably couldn't have said that about fight club 21 months after release.

worst hitch (number 17) is def worse than worst fincher (button), of what I've seen.

i love most of these, but fight club takes it, mostly because rewatching it and realizing how effectively fincher is actually satirizing the reaction i had to it when i was 19 (and i think hes really aware of how much "yeeeaaahhhh smash the state i want someone to hit me in the face" young alternadudes are going to respond with) is kind of an awesome and amazing feat.

― From Rax to Rich's (jjjusten), Sunday, February 15, 2009 4:05 PM (7 hours ago) Bookmark

^^^^

I agree, but I still think the "same person" reveal presents some plot holes that the whole movie falls through pretty easily. But I have said all of this before at length elsewhere on ILE.

"Yes. We are men. Men is what we are."

i liked spellbound!

it's easy to hate on Fight Club because of the um, "following" it got but it's still a pretty funny movie imo.

If anyone can ever make a good movie out of a Jim Thompson novel/story, and really understand how funny it's supposed to be, Fincher will be my vote, and Fight Club proves it. The problem with Fight Club (ok, MY problem) is that he was adapting something that was unadaptable by its very premise.

tbh, I didn't really like Aliens either.

― Johnny Fever, Sunday, 15 February 2009 10:19 (Yesterday) Permalink

that's because you have no testes

No James Cameron talk here.

fair enough

alien/aliens are my killing joke

The problem with Fight Club (ok, MY problem) is that he was adapting something that was unadaptable by its very premise.

Nah, I think the movie handles the adaptation amazingly well. The problem is that the movie is better made than the novel that it's based on is written.

Sweet Satan's gonads I hate Chuck Palahniuk.

No, the problem is that we're expected 4/5ths through the film to accept suddenly that ont of the characters does not exist. You can pull it off in a book, but not in a movie. The brain balks. You've been LOOKING at him for 4/5ths of the movie! On rewatch, it's hinting in clever ways, sure, but it still doesn't really work.

nah, i didn't have a problem with that.

Why bother hating Palahniuk? He writes dime store tales of shriveled testicles and hate. Which goes back to jjjusten's post about how great it is that Fincher kinda pissed on all that.

nah, i didn't have a problem with that.

So many don't. I blows my mind. It seems like the kind of thing you can't reasonably work around to me.

i never had any problem accepting that he didn't exist. it's...a movie.

i blows my mind too sometimes

Grrrr. Such a thing as a stupid, bad movie, you know. Not that Fight Club is that, exactly, but that's the worst argument possible.

xpost

I caught some of "The Big Chill" on cable a while ago, and I love the scene where William Hurt is wathing some old movie, and someone walks in and asks what it's about, and he says, "You're so analytical! Sometimes you just have to let the art flow over you." Uh huh.

i just don't see how it's such a problem in a movie that starts off so obviously subjective and stylized (going forward and backward in time, the main character talking directly to the camera, catalog entries coming to life, little imaginary penguins in ice caves, etc. etc.)

i mean, just saying, it's the least of any probs with that movie imo

i'm talking about the big chill obviously

No, the problem is that we're expected 4/5ths through the film to accept suddenly that ont of the characters does not exist. You can pull it off in a book, but not in a movie. The brain balks. You've been LOOKING at him for 4/5ths of the movie! On rewatch, it's hinting in clever ways, sure, but it still doesn't really work.

This is such a common enough trope that I someone having a problem with it actually surprises me!

Is it a trope or a major problem with the structure of the movie?

a problem like it's like a mistake that they didnt realize they had accidentally made them the same person?

xpost Oh, you meant a character not actually existing is a common trope?

...

?

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would it be less of a problem if FC was shot entirely from the POV of the Norton character, like a first person camera view? (as in Orson Welles' Heart of Darkness)

a problem like it's like a mistake that they didnt realize they had accidentally made them the same person?

Oh, of course that's what I meant. Quiet, you.

It's a problem with the medium itself, and what you can and cannot expect from it. One of the thing you can generally expect is that when a character appears onscreen, even if he does not properly reperly represent himself, he at least has a physical existence. The switch-over ("We have lost cabin pressure") works in the book, because you can question your own visualizations of the character, and have a little "ah-ha" moment, seeing that you've been tricked by the narrator. In a movie, if you try that same trick, you're asking the audience to reevaluate things they have seen with their own eyes. What good is putting it on film if what you see with your own eyes is suspect? I swear the first time I saw it, I almost walked out right then and there. I was nearly angry.

Typing, editing, not so good, plz forgive

Obv I read the book after.

i agree that portraying subjective states of consciousness is problematic in cinema....but there's a whole arsenal of tricks that movies have built up to overcome this. otherwise we'd have to ban dreams, fantasies....etc.

no one ever believes me, but i guessed they were the same character about 60% into the movie because it's telegraphed so heavily.

so, i should stress, it never felt like "cheating" to me at all. though one could say that it's part of the aesthetic strategy of the movie to TRICK you....

it is indeed telegraphed heavily. But I never saw it coming, because... the audacity!

i kinda know what you mean about arbitrary & lazy movie twists, it can feel a bit unsatisfying from a storytelling point of view when everything it just switched around at the last minute. but in FC the whole story is about the main dude's mental collapse so the twist doesn't exactly come out of nowhere.

I'm glad that I watched the rest of it that first time (and many times after), though, because the last 5th is the part that really ramps up the ridiculousness to the point where if you don't understand that it's satire, you've essentially failed to watch the movie.

I guess my argument is academic. It fucks with the medium in ways the medium isn't built for. It's a machine that leaks all over the place.

well actually you're making me wonder if it wasn't quite intentional to do that....(sort of a narrative version of the dicks spliced into the movie...)

Dude, the movie's last shot is a big giant dick "spliced" in. It's intentional, but I don't think it's fair.

im still not sure what your problem is with this besides the fact that you were blindsided by it.

many many movies present things onscreen that aren't meant to literally co-exist with the characters. it's part of movies' bag of tricks. this was sort of a once-in-a-lifetime non-repeatable trick that i thought worked pretty well.

It fucks with the medium in ways the medium isn't built for.

that's why it's so surprising! that's why i appreciate it!

Fight Club : plot twist :: Spanish Inquisition : soft pillows

So I guess I see how it works as comedy.

ie, as total nonsense

I'll rep for Fight Club, but I'm voting Zodiac. Fight Club will win because of lurking votes.

kenan, your objection is so alien to my experience of the film (and medium!) as to be all but nonsensical. it's very easy for me to accept subjectivity in film - to accept unreliable narration, delusion, even flat-out lying. i don't expect what i see to be accurate, unless scrupulous truth-recording seems to be the point, somehow. i mean, it helps in swallowing this kind of thing for there to be a clearly subjective 1st person narrative dragging me along (as there very obviously is in fight club), but even when there isn't, i'm not terribly bothered by the sudden subversion of what i've been shown.

i mean, the more elegant and the more carefully worked-out, the better. the 6th sense is less troubling than haute tension, because it abides so carefully by its own rules. fight club is a bit sloppy in this regard, but again, the subjectivity and delusionality of the POV help smooth over the rough spots. plus, the twist is so satisfying, narratively and thematically, that i'm just not inclined to object. it's not a rip-off, fairy tale, "it was all a dream" bummer -- it's surprising, sure, but almost head-slappingly obvious once you get over the shock. it makes sense. more than that, it's the film's necessary conclusion.

My problem with the twist in FC is not really the non-existence of Pitt's character rather than...

A) It wasn't really necessary to do it so literally. The movie was already hinting that Norton and Pitt were two sides of the same coin, and it could've done the revelation more subtly or in a more surreal manner instead of "OMG they're just split personalities in one body!" shocker. The gimmicky nature of the twist draws away attention from its thematic signifigance, which should've been more important. The silliness of doing the "same person" thing so literally is emphasized in the final confrontation between Pitt and Norton, which doesn't make much sense at all.

B) If Norton and Pitt are the same person, then a lot of the stuff preceding the revelation becomes kinda implausible. You really expect that all those Fight Club members would take as their Great Leader a guy who hits himself and talks to himself? You expect that Norton never notices there are holes in his memory the size of weeks or months, when he was setting up Fight Clubs in other cities? Now, all this would've been such a big problem if FC hadn't done the "they're the same!" revelation in such a literal fashion (they really are the same person in one body!), but because it did, we're supposed to take the rest of the film literally too, and that's kinda problematic.

Yeah, it's true that "he wasn't real/it was all dream" is a common trope in movies, but it's also true that it rarely works, because usually it's merely about cheating the audience and doing a twist for its gimmick value only.

The silliness of doing the "same person" thing so literally is emphasized in the final confrontation between Pitt and Norton, which doesn't make much sense at all.

Yeah, like where he blows out the part of his cheek that apparently contains other personalities. But I guess the movie jumped the rails so long before that that I shouldn't be bitching.

You really expect that all those Fight Club members would take as their Great Leader a guy who hits himself and talks to himself?

Yes. People see a dude beating himself in a parking lot, and go, "Me next?" One of the plot hole I was talking about that the entire movie falls right through.

didnt read this thread but fight club is boring fuiud

xpost

OTOH-- Please don't get me wrong. The first act of FC is just fucking brilliant and I've never seen anything like it. I've never seen comedy made out of the unfortunate confluence of horrifying self-awareness, ensuing insomnia, and finally cancer. And it really is funny, because it's not just dark, but genuinely mortal. Human, I mean.

You only piece it together afterwards, but the reason he can't sleep is because his job is essentially sizing up the monetary value of human lives -- fuck, I couldn't sleep, either. And the way that leads him into fascism... there's a movie there. Shit, there's a history of the 20th century there. But the splist personality? You can't sell me on it. It doe. Not. Work.

Does. Not etc.

jesus I'm going to bed. My typing is so over.

Oh who am I kidding, I can't sleep either.

I'm trying to fathom you finding anything to laugh about in Bulworth

Same laughing-to-keep-from-crying target I've had since 1980:

Democrats.

As for Fight Club, I've met very few gay men who didn't have a huge boner throughout. (Not just Pitt: our masculinity/aggression issues.)

kenan, im still waiting for you to set me up w/ yr age-inappropriate brother. :)

He's cute, but not your speed. Trust me on this. Age is not a factor.

i trust you.

I think he has a boner all through the sitcom "Reba".

aieeeeeeeeeeeeee :)

Yeah, I'm not allowed to go around thinking he's an idiot, but you almost certainly would.

no, cmon, i don't throw "idiot" around lightly.

No he's a sweet kid. Just don't expect conversation about film, is all I'm saying. Or television. Or books.

Baseball, he can do.

jeez you guys took divergent paths, eh? siblings...

I'm the outlier.

Sadly not in the way that Malcolm Gladwell would ever immortalize in one of his book-length prattles. I'm just the one who left town.

This is all really on the wrong thread altogether. Why'd you have to bring up my family?

alien3 is really really really bad

alien3 is great

alien3 is a really really really bad movie that's really really really great to look at

As for Fight Club, I've met very few gay men who didn't have a huge boner throughout. (Not just Pitt: our masculinity/aggression issues.)

We haven't met, but here's one.

He did Alien³? - Hate.
Se7en - Great.
The Game - Hate.
fucking Fight Club, dude! - Great.
Panic Room - Hate.
Brodiac - Great.
Dat Dude Benjamin Button - Not seen.

probably Zodiac.

agree w/ you kenan, WR2 the implausibility: blowing the bad self out of his brane makes no sense, reveal that fight club major domo was clearly bugfuck from day one makes some sense, but is a stretch. (still, you gotta admit that clearly insane "visionaries" are often able to put together armed cadres of equally insane followers. it might even be a requirement for true excellence in that line of work.)

still, the implausibility didn't bother me, much. a little, esp. the gunshot part, but not enough to break the deal. as you said earlier, the satire is pushed to such absurd extremes in the closing stretch that i'm much more concerned with humor & thematic integrity than with credibility & realism. it remains funny, affecting, involving and cohesive to the last, so i'm okay with the twist. agree w s1ocki that it's a once-in-a-lifetime type thing, that probably shouldn't work, but does.

i hated the end scene of fight club, too, but i always figured the point was that the way he got rid of Durden was by committing an 'exorcism' with a gun - like he had to want him bad enough to kill him. ok there's really no defending it. the buildings blowing up with the Pixies partially made up for it though.

i have never read the book, but i hate almost all of Palahnuik's endings.

I never really got the final scene with the exploding buldings. Was that just Norton's fantasy, or did it really happen? What's it supposed to mean? I thought he got over the urge to destroy things. Plus the "love conquers all" final message seemed kinda lame.

the way i read the ending, the buildings falling down were real (well in context of how real anything is in FC universe or whatever), not fantasy.

Okay, but what was the point of that scene?

It's not about "love conquers all" so much as it's about someone growing up and defeating narcissism by, you know, actually caring about other people.

Yeah, that was bit of an ironic comment. I got what happened to that character in the end, but I never really got why the exploding buildings needed to be added to the end... Doesn't that mean Durden ultimately won?

In the book the buildings don't blow up, because he gets the mixture of the explosive wrong.

re: why buildings fall down: to establish that this wasnt all a paranoid snowglobe fantasy for one thing. also, to keep us on the hook for getting into the "ohhhhyeeeeeaaaah" 19 year old vibe i mentioned earlier by maintaining consequence for the shit we have been enjoying for the first 90% of the movie without giving us a fantasy out at the end.

Buildings falling down is tyler's plan to erase all credit and debt. The lifeblood of consumer culture. Kind of timely, no? "back to zero" -- not sure it's really necessary to spell out all the ambiguous thematic meanings here!

re: why buildings fall down: to establish that this wasnt all a paranoid snowglobe fantasy for one thing. also, to keep us on the hook for getting into the "ohhhhyeeeeeaaaah" 19 year old vibe i mentioned earlier by maintaining consequence for the shit we have been enjoying for the first 90% of the movie without giving us a fantasy out at the end.

But by the end it is implied Norton is over Durden, yet he seems weirdly happy despite the falling buildings. Shouldn't he be devastated that Durden got his way in the end? That's why I always thought it was fantasy of his rather than real thing, though I'm not really sure what it would mean if it was a fantasy.

if the buildings stay up it removes any consequence for his actions at the end of the film (or, like i said, for the audience cheering him on throughout). i dont think the ending is about Norton "winning" AT ALL.

But why is he so content in the end then?

part of this is that theres way more id than superego in this movie, if you know what i mean. split personality aside, its about the battle between id and like super id or something.

xpost

dude he just shot himself in the face and realized that he has been batshit crazy and at least one person is dead due to his actions, i think you are kind of falling for a very fake engineered "happy ending" here that isnt the deeper intention AT ALL

also jesus christ i am arguing about fight club on the internet

I think that maybe Jack realises that blowing up some office blocks isn't going to wipe out credit/debt and that Tyler's whole plan has failed. And Tyler is "dead". And Jack still has Marla. And he's found a middle ground between being a corporate doormat on the one hand and an anarchist on the other.

(xpost) better than organising a fight club on the internet - people who do that have seriously missed the point of the movie...

dude he just shot himself in the face and realized that he has been batshit crazy and at least one person is dead due to his actions, i think you are kind of falling for a very fake engineered "happy ending" here that isnt the deeper intention AT ALL

Well what's the deeper meaning then? And why did the filmmakers engineer a fake happy ending?

dude

also jesus christ i am arguing about fight club on the internet

dude you are arguing with Tuomas about fight club on the internet

i know i just had this moment where i realized that i was engaged in some sort of turing test socratic "teaching tuomas how to form concepts" thing.

Arnie: "Tuomas starts to learn at a geometric rate. It becomes self-aware at 2:14 a.m"

You know, I'm just asking because I never really got what Fincher meant with the last scene. If he was supposed to show the sad consequences of Durden's work, why was the main character so content in the end? And if it was supposed to be a happy ending (he got past his juvenile issues), why the falling buildings? If you have an answer to that, maybe you could just explain it instead of snarky comments...

he was content because shit blowing up is awesome

Dude pwned some cops, ran through town without any pants, his crew turned up with beer, he blew up a building, and he's like totally going to score... Who wouldn't be happy?

I mean, that's pretty much my perfect weekend, right there...

serious answer: it's a "woah cool awesome" ending tacked on to replace the novel's anticlimactic ending. Sort of like the end of Pulp Fiction is a "happy ending", even though you know that Travolta's character gets killed "later".

OK, time to lift this whole thread over to that other thread.

I see the ending in more formalist terms. It's funny and even ironic considering what just happened. Return of the repressed. Tyler's not just gonna go away that easily. Our culture hasn't changed and what he stands for hasn't been eliminated. His appeal is enduring

Also the last shot is not buildings falling but a dick. We're being winked at. It's a provocation not a moral.

would you say brad pitt is a guy who appears in art films like this and brainless popcorn movies?

It's like the end of a horror movie when we see that the monster isn't quite dead....

Bottom line: 4/5 of any Fincher movie is outstanding. The only variable is which 4/5.

no stories have happy endings if the story goes on long enough

a reading from the book of morbz

On a long enough time line, the likelyhood of a story having a happy ending drops to zero.

asymptotically?

Is Fincher, Morbius or Tuomas the Zen Asshole here?

Open your mind to the possibility of multiple Zen Assholes.

You know, I'm just asking because I never really got what Fincher meant with the last scene. If he was supposed to show the sad consequences of Durden's work, why was the main character so content in the end? And if it was supposed to be a happy ending (he got past his juvenile issues), why the falling buildings? If you have an answer to that, maybe you could just explain it instead of snarky comments...

― Tuomas, Monday, February 16, 2009 9:02 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

maybe fincher, instead of making a film, should have written a statement about 'what he means', and his views on masculinity, consumerism, etc., clearly and umambiguously.

ya, i mean, how could you end a movie with one of the characters seeming content when its not meant to be a big obvious happy ending??

So you don't think it's weird at all that he doesn't seem to be bothered by the collapsing buildings?

would you rather he fall to his knees and go nooooooooooooo

i mean how much more obvious a metaphor than falling buildings = big life change do you need dude

Well, that would've made more sense, if the falling buildings were real, since he was trying to stop the from exploding just a few minutes ago. His non-reaction to the destruction made me think it was a projection or a fantasy.

(x-post)

i mean how much more obvious a metaphor than falling buildings = big life change do you need dude

Yeah, that was my impression too, but some people seem to think the falling buildings were real.

they can be real (in the events of the movie) and metaphorical (because hte movie is not a documentary)

it's like The Empire Strikes Back - Norton's arm around Maria like Luke's around Leia, the buildings falling like the Falcon warping off to find Han - things aren't good, but sometimes just being alive is enough.

all this aside, the ending is basically shitty bullshit

it's a "woah cool awesome" ending tacked on to replace the novel's anticlimactic ending.

― snoball, Monday, February 16, 2009 8:09 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark

Dunno I always preferred the ending of the book tbh. It makes the same point (the violent impulse is still in him no matter how he tries to paper over it) in a much creepier fashion.

they can be real (in the events of the movie) and metaphorical (because hte movie is not a documentary)

Er, that's not what I meant.

Yeah, that was my impression too, but some people seem to think the falling buildings were real.

― Tuomas, Monday, February 16, 2009 9:50 PM (7 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

?

do you get how they can be real, and still be a metaphor for change?

"Real" inside the movie's universe as opposed to mere fantasy inside the main character's head.

(x-post)

yes. do you get that.

i took the images at the top of this thread to mean david fincher directed one or more ER episodes haha

That's the thing I've been trying to say the whole time: to me the main character's reaction towards the falling buildings only makes sense if they're not real (though I still don't quite get why he would be fantasizing about the thing he was trying to stop a few minutes earlier). But some people on this thread are saying that the buildings are really exploding. If they really are falling, I don't understand why the main character would be so non-caring about that, since he was trying to stop them from falling just a few minutes earlier.

(xx-post)

because that is the moment he lets go and accepts change.

or something!!!

the point is we're talking about a character who literally lived as two separate people so a bit of inconsistency in his emotions, especially as he just shot himself in the face, is not exactly surprising

also losing the burden of responsibility, even when it means a bad consequence, is elating

Yeah he's content DESPITE the buildings collapsing (presumably because of martha) not BECAUSE of them falling.

tuomas asking the same question 15 times is not getting you any closer to the answer you seek.

going to go out on a limb here and suggest maybe i dont know watching the movie again is going to do more for you than asking a bunch of exasperated dudes to find new ways of explaining it to you over and over again

because that is the moment he lets go and accepts change.

It still doesn't make much sense to me... Is the dude just like, "All these buildings are exploding and thousands of people are dying because of me, but I accept it as an metaphor for my inner change, so time to move on!"?

(several x-posts)

You do no that no one is dying, because they very carefully make sure the buildings are empty?

No one is dying. Buildings are empty!

Yeah he's content DESPITE the buildings collapsing (presumably because of martha) not BECAUSE of them falling.

I still don't think he'd be content in a situation where an horrible disaster he was just trying to stop happened anyway.

total pedantic point and i dont know why i am bothering but a huge effort is made to clearly state that the exploding buildings have no people in them

xposts hahahahaha dragging us all out to correct A+

Eh, if those building were falling down like shown in the end of the movie, at least a lot of people on the streets would die, even if the buildings were empty.

you do realize that the character is not you

To me the ending always seemed like a weird fantasy... The falling buildings even look fake, though maybe that's just because of bad CGI.

maybe only the tyler durden half of tuomas actually watched the end of the movie, and now we're stuck filling in the gaps for the norton half

You've obviously never been to the financial district of Wilmington, Delaware. There is absolutely zero reason for anyone to be there at night.

you do realize that the character is not you

Well yeah, but nothing in the movie's internal logic really explains the character's reaction in the end.

And despite all this I don't buy that he's "content" -- I'd say sheepish at best!

resigned more than content. If you want, chalk it up to the massive endorphin rush he's getting from having shot himself.

"everything's going to be ok" ---> explosions, buildings explode = audience laughs.

Then BAM! big dick.

^^^^^^^this

(previous two posts both)

this whole thing is going to be all the more facepalm.jpg when fight club gets the shit kicked out of it by zodiac when the results post

That's my best explanation for the ending too... Fincher just wanted do put a big shocking scene there without thinking much whether it makes sense or not.

(x-post to Ryan)

i agree with you as long as you add "to tuomas" to the end of that statement

Why do you think the character reacts the way he does then?

kenan, in what world does alien3 look good? it looks like somebody puked gray dust all over a lego version of blade runner

If the scene made sense to you...?

(xpost)

tuomas i just gave you 1000000 fuckin reasons a fictional human being such as he might react in that situation

There are several different interpretations of how the scene makes sense in this very thread and all of them are consistent with Nortons performance as well as the editing.

Yeah, I read the interpretations, they just don't sound very credible to me. To me Norton's reaction is just incoherent with happened previously in the movie: he realized Durden was wrong, he "killed" Durden and tried to stop his plan, so he should be bloody devastated when Durden's dream came true anyway, not just be happy about his inner growth and his new girlfriend.

what more could he do at that moment anyway, tuomas?

i would imagine that stopping durden for good is a bigger triumph than saving some buildings.

norton in the alternate final scene of FC:

http://stickandballguy.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2007/06/simpsons-the-doh-4900579.jpg

what more could he do at that moment anyway, tuomas?

I dunno, be shocked or sad for all the destruction and death? Something like that.

Isn't Fight Club a surrealist fantasy, like Time Bandits or Dementia 13? I think worrying about plot holes and unrealistic science is pretty much beside the point in this genre.

yeah man they're witnessing the final legacies of durden in spectacular hyper-real metafictional array and it's quite thrilling/funny, that's all the ending is tbh, an exclamation mark

and a winking emoticon

Fuck it - it's a goddamn FAIRY TALE.

Yeah this is getting confusing and pointless. I always interpreted his reaction to the buildings as "oh shit" and fear and shock and a little bit of resignation to Tyler winning yet again. He takes her hand and you have two people holding hands as the world collapses. It's pretty poignant and funny and clever and ambiguous and provocative. It's a perfect ending for that movie.

He runs forward, drops to his knees, aghast at what he sees; the destruction he was powerless to stop. His face is pressed to the glass:

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_6B8tPuW7TwQ/SJ1unZUrjQI/AAAAAAAAGOY/Ks9mq7R4qyc/s400/animglas.jpg

ryan has been hitting OTM jackpot here

loooool @ that last picture

If FC would've ended with that it would've been perfect!

also losing the burden of responsibility, even when it means a bad consequence, is elating

― s1ocki, Monday, February 16, 2009 10:11 PM (25 minutes ago) Bookmark

i think you mean the DURDEN of responsibility

amirite??

amazing thread

THE ENDING IS A JOKE. IT FEATURES A COCK SPLICED INTO IT.

HOW ARE YOU NOT BANNED TUOMAS?

HOW?

HOW?

all this aside, the ending is basically shitty bullshit

― max, Monday, February 16, 2009 9:53 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

out of the last 50 posts, i support this and the monkey picture.

I'll try: Durden was always a part of "Jack" so shooting himself in the face just got rid of the vivid schizo hallucination of Durden. The two characters merged at the end, with Jack back in control. So Jack really didn't give a fuck when the buildings blew because 9/11 hadn't happened yet, so it was ok to blow up buildings for a laugh.

but really it's:

"everything's going to be ok" ---> explosions, buildings explode = audience laughs.

― ryan, Monday, February 16, 2009 2:24 PM (5 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Then BAM! big dick.

― EZ Snappin, Monday, February 16, 2009 2:24 PM (5 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Fite Klub

ppl who pick zodiac are disgusting savages imo

HOW ARE YOU NOT BANNED TUOMAS?

HOW?

HOW?

― ^^ one of enriques sincere posts (special guest stars mark bronson), Monday, February 16, 2009 6:31 PM (2 weeks ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

http://imagecache2.allposters.com/images/pic/151/501307~Two-Weeks-Notice-Posters.jpg

^^ best david fincher

no way, too much weerd camera angles, totally dumb.

Brad Pitt yelling "Awww! What's in the Box?" never gets old.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

excellent work everyone

sheeeit that is a big turnout.

Wonder what percentage of Fight Club voters voted to sb Tuomas.

i voted Zodiac but I'm pretty sure i sb'd Tuomas on the basis of this thread.

lolz were there actually that many people that saw Zodiac. Didn't it die at the box office...?

Yeah real people didn't see it. Just special ILX people.

xpost. there are these things called the internet and dvds.

I dunno dog my best friend works at a construction site and he was like "yo Zodiac is tha shit"

x-post

Fuck you! Tha shit iz played. Fight Club complete set iz da bomb.

I haven't seen BB or Zodiac so I guess what I'm taking out of this thread is "watch zodiac, don't watch BB"

Is there a anticipatory thread for The Social Network anywhere?

I care more about the soundtrack than the actual movie, but still

Facebook: the movie

thx

this is still zodiac

only one i really like

Clooney being out of focus to Anthony Edwards in that poll photo cracked me up.

I'd vote Social Network now. Least grungy.

What does anyone think of his Girl With The Dragon Tattoo?

Now I see the thread... Come Anticipate With Severe Misgivings the David Fincher version of the Dragon Tattoo book

and that's where i jump off the Fincher bus

I rewatched Zodiac over christmas and it's pretty impressive.

Zodiac and Social Network are both impressive, will always have a soft spot for the earlier stuff, won't be touching goth detective movies with a bargepole

can hardly think of a better opening 5 minutes than Zodiac's. beautifully shot, amazingly well-soundtracked, fantastically well lit, cut, acted and goes from being something gorgeous (the fireworks) to something horrifying (the murders) very quickly but very slickly. as if that weren't enough the opening few *seconds* are those faux-1970s versions of the Warners and Paramount idents. incredible movie.

zodiac is easily dude's best

also i find it amazing how *seriously* people took fight club when it came out. watching the movie now it's so clearly a comedy.

well how old were your friends when it came out?

my vote is social network but I haven't seen the two at the bottom of the results

still not gonna see that dragon tattoo, benjamin button neither

my contrarian vote would probably go 7 but yah this is p obv zodiac

I'm not looking to throw down or anything but imo all his movies since Panic Room look like shit, even if a couple are good.

I watched Se7en the other day and I was all RIP pretty Fincher movies.

zodiac, facebook, se7en, fight club; like that

would vote for Madonna's Vogue video if it was an option.

I guess it's a testament to how good Zodiac is that I don't hate it even though I find it's glorification of Graysmith totally fucking repulsive.

its, shit

most unfairly under-rated is clearly The Game which is fricking brilliant too. most over-rated has to be The Social Network.

Wish Jodie Foster had the Brad Pitt role in Fight Club.

The Girl with the Benjamin Button.

would vote for Madonna's Vogue video if it was an option.

If his videos were allowable I would have voted for this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NCZuYS-9qaw&ob=av2e

His first video!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLnu8SzOGfs

i don't find Graysmith to be "glorified" in Zodiac

I have never seen that one, it was going for Duran levels of video bombast!

His movies need more cackling lizards.

xp

i don't find Graysmith to be "glorified" in Zodiac

― the white plies (Noodle Vague), Thursday, January 5, 2012 2:11 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

the movie says he basically solved the case!

Like, have you ever read Graysmith's "solution" to the 340 cipher that the movie casually says he solved?

portraying Graysmith as anything other than a fraud is to glorify him.

he also wasn't jake gyllenhall. GLORIFICATION!

Yeah, Graysmith's a nutter. Even the stuff he did in the first book, he was obsessed beyond all rationality, and the followup book strained credulity to ridiculous lenghts. It read like the rantings of an obsessive. It makes for good reading but he's basically crazypants.

the movie leaves it as more of a "or did he??"

In December 1983, a full 14 years after the original slayings, Graysmith tracks down Allen to a Vallejo hardware store, where he is employed as a salesclerk. After Allen asks if he can help Graysmith with anything, they stare at each other for a moment with blank expressions before Graysmith simply replies with a 'No,' and leaves the hardware store.

Eight years later, in 1991, Mageau (Jimmi Simpson) meets with authorities and identifies Allen from a police mugshot.

Final title cards, however, inform the audience that Allen died in 1992 before he could be further questioned by police, and that DNA tests performed in 2002 did not match samples gathered from the Zodiac letters.

the movie says he basically solved the case!

no it does not

omar OTM

imho Graysmith is largely portrayed as a gifted but deluded/self-absorbed pest

i think the film implies he started to see things that weren't there. to compare it to JFK, where oliver stone believed everything jim garrison was selling. i think fincher was more like, "well it sure is interesting, all those coincidences, but...."

more than anyone else, Toschi is the hero of the movie

def not Gyllenhall:

http://s14.allstarpics.net/images/huge/h/6/h610gtzwb3n8b83.jpg

the title cards are like "oh haha sorry our movie is bullshit"

i think the film implies he started to see things that weren't there.

exactly - the scene with the movie projectionist dude!

i mean that title card is the opposite of the one at the end of JFK, where it notes that a former CIA guy admitted clay shaw was a CIA agent (which was in fact not true at all!)

the title cards are like "oh haha sorry our movie is bullshit"

the opening frame of the movie does this!

the movie accepts the coincidences that Graysmith invented.

nah, the entire movie is basically about how you can't trust movies/media representations

the birthday call is just a total invention that is presented in the movie as fact.

zodiac isn't about figuring out who did it, but more about the atmosphere of paranoia and spookiness created by not knowing the truth and the drive to figure it out.

nothing in the movie is presented as a fact. the opening title card says "this movie is based on actual case files" (or something to that effect, I can't remember the exact wording) - and then later on in the movie the case files are acknowledged to have been destroyed/lost

zodiac isn't about figuring out who did it, but more about the atmosphere of paranoia and spookiness created by not knowing the truth and the drive to figure it out.

― omar little, Friday, January 6, 2012 9:29 PM (54 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

These are the strengths of the movie. The weakness of the movie is a phony conclusion that gives the narrative a satisfying dramatic resolution. The truth is that Graysmith's pet suspect has been completely cleared multiple times, and is only a suspect because he decided to taunt a couple of police interviewers once.

nothing in the movie is presented as a fact. the opening title card says "this movie is based on actual case files" (or something to that effect, I can't remember the exact wording) - and then later on in the movie the case files are acknowledged to have been destroyed/lost

― The Silent Extreme (Shakey Mo Collier), Friday, January 6, 2012 9:32 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

oh come on. "case files" have nothing to do with the hilarious idea that Graysmith solved the 340 cipher! "case files" have nothing to do with Graysmith's totally disproven theory that the birthday call happened on allen's birthday.

Graysmith needed a solution to the mystery to sell more books, and the movie went with it.

lol Matt do you believe people when they tell you not to believe anything they say

movie undercuts its own credibility at every turn, this is the crux of the film

Gyllenhaal's rather annoying too tbh.

for example, three different actors portray the killers in the three murder scenes. multiple voices are presented as the Zodiac "speaking". The movie goes down numerous blind alleys and then lets them drop. The ending is deliberately ambiguous.

xp

agree that Gyllenhaal's the weakest of the three leads, it's unfortunate the last third is almost all him

the sideburns are teh hawt but the performance is too puppyish.

just looking at this revived thread makes me want to watch Zodiac again...

Recently saw The Game for the first time over the Holidays and thought it was very good.

ugh i hate when movies have a satisfying dramatic resolution

for example, three different actors portray the killers in the three murder scenes. multiple voices are presented as the Zodiac "speaking". The movie goes down numerous blind alleys and then lets them drop. The ending is deliberately ambiguous.

― The Silent Extreme (Shakey Mo Collier), Friday, January 6, 2012 9:39 PM (0 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

the birthday call shit is presented as fact, as is Graysmith solving the 340 cipher. Where's the ambiguity in those sequences?

btw why do people hate panic room. i think its pretty fun

ugh i hate when movies have a satisfying dramatic resolution

― congratulations (n/a), Friday, January 6, 2012 9:42 PM (35 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

yeah, too bad they had to pin it on an innocent guy. Oh well!

was just going to say that i rewatched panic room and the game recently and both were pretty great, lots of black humor in both. my main complaint is that they're each about 10-15 minutes too long.

fave part in panic room is when jodie foster's about to light the gas in the air vent on fire and jared leto's on the other side with his face pressed up against the wall. hilarious!

how does a film present something as a fact

xp

especially a film where the themes are the unreliability of media narratives and the impossibility of determining the truth

how does a film present something as a fact
― The Silent Extreme (Shakey Mo Collier), Friday, January 6, 2012 9:45 PM (17 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

without ambiguity or nuance, in a film that is based on real events?

the maid says the call was on allen's birthday. It wasn't. Where's the wiggle room here?

Gyllenhall himself described Graysmith as "the man who solved the case."

actor says stupid thing shockah

I dunno, the maid was lying, or remembered it wrong? why is she any more reliable than any of the other unreliable people in the movie?

“Everyone involved in this spent years working it. They became obsessed with it. Then they became haunted by it. And finally, at least in Paul’s case, they felt defeated by it. David’s primary interest, I thought, was not the killer, or even catching the killer, even though to my mind, the film solves the mystery.” -- David Fincher

oh sry that's ruffalo

I dunno, the maid was lying, or remembered it wrong? why is she any more reliable than any of the other unreliable people in the movie?

― The Silent Extreme (Shakey Mo Collier), Friday, January 6, 2012 9:50 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

wow you're really cutting it thin here. She didn't tell Graysmith that it was on that day irl. It was a Graysmith invention.

I just think it's weird that you can watch this movie and come away thinking it accurately depicted anything at all. that's just bizarre.

I mean, I don't trust a single frame of this movie or consider it as representing reality in any way

I mean, I don't trust a single frame of this movie or consider it as representing reality in any way

― The Silent Extreme (Shakey Mo Collier), Friday, January 6, 2012 9:55 PM (15 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

But a lot of the movie is accurate! The filmmakers took great pains to depict things with accuracy, even down to the amazing details on some of the Zodiac letters. But then they have all this fictitious junk in the movie that implicates an innocent person.

that's called misdirection

You're acting as if the movie weaves ambiguity into everything, when really it just spits out all of Graysmith's junk without nuance or criticism.

right from the start the film is about media distortions/misrepresentation - the first killing is immediately followed by the newspapermen debating how their actions may affect the investigation, the public, the killer, etc. you have Toschi scowling his way through a screening of Dirty Harry. Belli touting his experience being on Star Trek. Gyllenhaal decoding things with movie references. the projectionist red herring. Newspapers misattributing killings/attacks to the zodiac (woman on the highway with the baby). RDJ's button campaign/media fixation. The opening and closing title cards. This stuff is ALL over the movie, and to me, seems pretty deliberately placed to call the movie's own credibility into question.

I think Zodiac perfectly captures the milieu of unsolved mysteries and the people who obsess over them. ANY website or book or "documentary" on the Zodiac (or any other uncaught serial killer or big-time unsolved mystery) is just as unreliable and prone to repeating disproven events/facts and lavishing detail in some areas while remaining completely obtuse to other facets.

Y know. Come to think of it, I don't remember really anyone taking Fight Club "seriously" when it came out.

Dragon Tattoo now edges Button as my least favorite Fincher.

Newspapers misattributing killings/attacks to the zodiac (woman on the highway with the baby).

The Zodiac took credit for this in a letter, and imo it probably was Z. All the other stuff you mentioned are essential parts of the true story. People really did wear those Avery buttons, Zodiac made a ton of movie references so being interested in movie clues made sense etc.

I think Zodiac perfectly captures the milieu of unsolved mysteries and the people who obsess over them. ANY website or book or "documentary" on the Zodiac (or any other uncaught serial killer or big-time unsolved mystery) is just as unreliable and prone to repeating disproven events/facts and lavishing detail in some areas while remaining completely obtuse to other facets.

― Frobisher (Viceroy), Friday, January 6, 2012 10:05 PM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

No, plenty of books on unsolved crimes have the good grace to not pretend that the author has solved it.

there's an important scene towards the end when Toschi says "I can't prove this" and Graysmith says "I'm not asking you as a cop" and i always found that particular scene so amazingly interesting because it's about how truth is constructed, and how Graysmith has that idea that he just needs to see him face to face and then he'll know for sure. i think that tense, between "knowing" and Knowing is one of the really interesting things about the movie.

now, maybe the movie is somehow advocating Graysmith's certitude but that's hard to square with the nearly Derridean levels of irony and ambiguity throughout. and i think the movie is allowed to pull us in two directions like that, it can contain both elements.

tense = tension

Weirdly, as I'm reading this, my wife is watching Criminal Minds, and one of the characters just said, "The Zodiac Killer changed his victims all the time - Young, old, black, white …" and another responds, "And he killed for over 30 years without being caught." And I'm like, WTF, Zodiac's known victims comprise 3 young white couples, 1 young-ish white cab driver, and took place over the course of less than 12 months!!

Xpost The Zodiac took credit for this in a letter, and imo it probably was Z.

It almost certainly wasn't.

xxp haha plenty = a minority that are read in academia and not very popular on the true crime shelves.

Xpost The Zodiac took credit for this in a letter, and imo it probably was Z.

It almost certainly wasn't.

― i couldn't adjust the food knobs (Phil D.), Friday, January 6, 2012 10:13 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Why do you say this?

I'm gonna defer to this excellent essay which makes a number of my points better than I can, to wit:

Zodiac's concerns extend past simply depicting the efforts to nab the titular fiend, and toward an examination of the two-way mirror between film and reality. In one of his first missives to the San Francisco Chronicle, the man-hunting Zodiac aptly references The Most Dangerous Game, an instance of life being influenced by (and imitating) art that finds its flipsides later on, first when someone calls Toschi "Bullitt"—a sly allusion to the fact that the detective was the basis for Steve McQueen's iconic S.F. cop—and then when Dirty Harry premieres, Zodiac-ish villain in tow. Fincher decorates background walls with classic movie posters and includes a self-indicting, pre-opening credit visual clue (elucidated during the third act) that speaks to cinema's potent cultural impact, a point succinctly emphasized by Zodiac in a late letter: "Waiting for a good movie about me, I wonder who will play me."

The influence movies exert on Zodiac's rampage, and the resultant desire to have his deeds refracted through the camera's eye, is a dynamic that manifests itself similarly in the killer's relationship with the news media. Through his numerous handwritten letters, the Zodiac cannily (and chillingly) uses the press for his own devious means, an act of manipulation Fincher shows repeated by the papers and television, who latch onto the story not simply for objective reportage purposes but for their own self-interested reasons. "He's [Zodiac] in it for the press," deduces boozy, ascot-wearing San Francisco Chronicle crime reporter Paul Avery (Robert Downey Jr., exhibiting his usual quirky, flamboyant mannerisms). It's a selfish motive that Toschi accuses Avery of sharing—saying the man's articles are driven by the desire to "up circulation"—and which underwrites everything from the city's broadsheet competition over the news item to Graysmith's suggestion that Avery sell for profit the buttons ("I Am Not Avery") which appear after the reporter receives a personal threat from the Zodiac. By the time attorney Melvin Belli (Brian Cox) appears on TV at the Zodiac's request, it's clear that everyone involved has helped greedily transform the case into sensationalistic entertainment, so that when Belli argues that "Killing is his compulsion" and Toschi shoots back "Could be, or maybe he just likes the attention," Zodiac has already proven both lines of thought to be true, and inextricably linked.

Questioned about the veracity of Avery's apparent discovery of the Zodiac's first victim, Toschi's partner William Armstrong (Anthony Edwards) replies, "It's very real. You know how I know? I saw it on TV." A sense of the media being the primary vehicle for truth permeates the proceedings. Fincher, however, shrewdly challenges such impressions at regular intervals, such as when a Vallejo, CA sergeant (Elias Koteas) bends rules and gives amateur sleuth Graysmith access to confidential files because Zodiac is "yesterday's news, so what's the harm?"—a statement that reveals press attention to be the crucial force behind (and, as implied by Graysmith's eventual success, an obstacle to) investigative work. In this light, Fincher's sterling montage featuring newspaper headlines, Zodiac scribblings, and camera lenses overlaid on a shot of detectives in police HQ cleverly captures the incestuous bond between Zodiac and those who are covering/hunting him, a connection that increasingly seems to foreshadow elements of our own contemporary, exploitative information age. The Zodiac's letter-writing antics may have been partially inspired by Jack the Ripper (a kindred spirit, certainly), but Fincher's film astutely and persuasively intimates that his utilization of—and history of having been influenced by—the media and cinema also make him a distinctly modern serial killer.

admittedly Johns is nuts but lots of elements of the Johns case have echoes of earlier Z crimes, and he did take credit for it. xp

Because her original police report makes none of the claims she later made about the driver threatening to kill her or throw her baby out the window, and in fact says he was friendly and accommodating, if elusive. Zodiac only took credit long after there were police reports about the incident in the newspapers. Even the self-styled amateur detectives at Zodiackiller.com don't think he had anything to do with this.

lol I just got yr dn ref, Viceroy

still not gonna see that dragon tattoo, benjamin button neither

― lag∞n, Thursday, January 5, 2012 1:12 AM (Yesterday) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

otm

but Phil, Matt knows the TRUTH!

there's an important scene towards the end when Toschi says "I can't prove this" and Graysmith says "I'm not asking you as a cop" and i always found that particular scene so amazingly interesting because it's about how truth is constructed, and how Graysmith has that idea that he just needs to see him face to face and then he'll know for sure. i think that tense, between "knowing" and Knowing is one of the really interesting things about the movie.

To me this scene is more about how they don't have hard evidence on ala, but the (fake) circumstantial evidence is so strong.

Because her original police report makes none of the claims she later made about the driver threatening to kill her or throw her baby out the window, and in fact says he was friendly and accommodating, if elusive. Zodiac only took credit long after there were police reports about the incident in the newspapers. Even the self-styled amateur detectives at Zodiackiller.com don't think he had anything to do with this.

― i couldn't adjust the food knobs (Phil D.), Friday, January 6, 2012 10:18 PM (51 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

But someone DID set the car on fire.

and he wants to see it in a film just to be sure

xp

To me this scene is more about how they don't have hard evidence on ala, but the (fake) circumstantial evidence is so strong.

i agree, but (perhaps erroneously) see that distinction loaded with metaphysical significance!

Setting things on fire was not exactly Zodiac's MO, so what could that possibly have to do with anything?

Setting things on fire was not exactly Zodiac's MO, so what could that possibly have to do with anything?

― i couldn't adjust the food knobs (Phil D.), Friday, January 6, 2012 10:21 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

unless you think the Domingos/Edwards murders were Z.

whether he threatened the baby or not, her report was someone disabled her car, acted creepy as fuck and then set fire to her car after she jumped out. Why isn't that Z? No real reason to think it isn't, considering he claimed credit. and it's inclusion in the movie isn't some sort of "ambiguity," it's a critical incident in the case.

Oh, brother. MAYBE ALL UNSOLVED MURDERS IN NORTHERN CALIFORNIA ARE THE ZODIAC.

Of the people we absolutely, positively know he killed, fire did not play a part in any of them, so.

the cheri jo bates case also had the disabled car ruse.

I mean, maybe he didn't do it, but the fact that he set the car on fire is pretty much irrelevant considering this was his one failed murder. I think whoever this was didn't expect her to be pregnant and chickened out.

Whoa, hoss, hold on there, in the official documentation of the case, there is literally nothing that connects the dude who gave her a ride to whomever set her car on fire. If you're going to get all shirty about circumstantial evidence and innocent people, you may want to step lightly. The most we can say is that the guy who gave her a ride could have been charged with kidnapping.

Again, nothing in Johns's story conforms to the MO of the crimes we absolutely know were committed by Zodiac. Hell, he took credit in letters for 30+ victims when we only know of seven. I guess we should just take his word for it, he seems like an honest fella.

Johns was the only crime he specifically took credit for though, unless he really wrote the Lass card.

I'm not positive it was Z or anything, just would have to guess it is.

1. disabled car like the Bates case
2. took credit for it specifically in a letter

enough to get it over 50% for me.

as for his MO, considering how completely off the rails he went with Paul Stine, who knows what he wanted to expand to?

look everyone just CALM DOWN. i think we're getting somewhere, but the place we don't want to get is ahead of ourselves. we're closer than we think, but we need to be careful. okay, matt? phil? i'm sending you to vallejo TONIGHT. shakey, take pacific heights. i'll coordinate with riverside PD.

but they don't have a fax machine!

Try to follow the string here. Johns's incident happened on 3/22/1970. She claims it was the Zodiac - based on the police composite poster she claims to have seen - and goes to the papers with it. They cover it because of continued interest since the Stine murder in Sept. 1969. FOUR MONTHS LATER, Zodiac takes credit it for it, having seen it in the papers.

In modern parlance, this is called "trolling." Had it really been Zodiac, he would have kept something from her car to prove it was him. He was all about offering physical proof.

btw, the great irony of the Stine case is that it doesn't fit Z's MO or profile at all, yet it's the one case where he gave us absolute proof he did it.

In modern parlance, this is called "trolling." Had it really been Zodiac, he would have kept something from her car to prove it was him. He was all about offering physical proof.

― i couldn't adjust the food knobs (Phil D.), Friday, January 6, 2012 10:36 PM (45 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

? He only offered physical proof once.

this was his one failed murder

Uh no he failed to kill fully a third of his victims, namely Mike Mageau and Bryan Hartnell.

xp He also wrote on Hartnell's car door.

And specifically named the ammo used in the Ferrin/Mageau attack.

yeah I should have said aborted murder. xp

I don't see why Z would take physical evidence to prove he did it considering it was an aborted crime.

That's the thing about this guy and that,s what Fincher's movie exploits so well - as serial killers go, he was shitty! He attacked three couples and only succeeded in killing both of the victims once, and he damn near got caught on the Stine killing. And yet the media, and people generally, built him into the image of this unstoppable boogeyman based on some letters he sent. It should be pretty obvious how taking credit for things you didn't do would play into this.

there were other possible Z crimes he didn't take credit for, though. Why not take (explicit) credit for Donna Lass? I think on balance, taking specific credit for the Johns case is evidence in its favor w/r/t Z's involvement.

at the very least you have to cut me some slack w/r/t MO. The Stine case proved he was adapting his routine.

there were other possible Z crimes he didn't take credit for, though.

Yes, because there weren't breathless ZODIAC THREATENED TO THROW MY BABY OUT CAR WINDOW newspaper stories about them.

I dunno the Johns case kinda makes Z look like a huge fuckup, right? Why take credit for that instead of a successful murder or a disappearance?

I don't think the Stine case proves anything except a) he got sloppy and almost got himself caught, and b) in all likelihood it scared him into never killing again. Far from being a "change in routine," it's an outlier following three very similar crimes, after which history records no definite further criminal from the perpetrator.

I like to think that one day, someone will find something when cleaning out their parents' or gramdparents' belongings that shows definitively who Zodiac was, but I also find it highly unlikely.

"further criminal activity"

Au contraire, it makes him look like the devil. "This one got away, but I still made her pay, and I can be anyone, anywhere!"

I don't think the Stine case proves anything except a) he got sloppy and almost got himself caught, and b) in all likelihood it scared him into never killing again. Far from being a "change in routine," it's an outlier following three very similar crimes, after which history records no definite further criminal from the perpetrator.
― i couldn't adjust the food knobs (Phil D.), Friday, January 6, 2012 10:49 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

1 out of 4 isn't an outlier, it's 25%.

Major takeaway from Zodiac: The Movie (and this is pretty much true to real life) was that the Zodiac sure did like to fuck with the cops and the press and inflate his own importance, which makes Zodiac writing letters taking credit for things he didn't do not noteworthy.

I mean this dude scared an entire city into utter shitlessness just by saying "Hey, maybe I'll shoot some kids on a school bus" despite never having targeted children in any of his crimes. Taking credit for Johns, after everyone already thought it was him based on her rantings, was an easy way of maintaining his (unearned) terrifying reputation.

And between the Johns incident and the letter in which he took credit, he wrote three other letters in which he never mentioned it. Only after he complains repeatedly in those three letters about people not wearing Zodiac buttons does he then claim, "Oh yeah I did this thing too that was already reported in your papers ARE YOU SCARED YET TROLOLOLOL?"

ok you're actually convincing me lol

I'll bump it down to 10%

it's interesting that the two most disputed Z cases, both of which he claimed credit for in more oblique ways, are so similar.

Sometimes I think the reason he was never caught and why some of the crimes were executed so poorly is because there were two people working together, splitting them up. But that seems kinda silly, the Hillside Stranglers notwithstanding.

have you guys solved the case yet

he seemed to keep getting worse at his "job" xp

http://www.toplessrobot.com/00-20-31.jpg

have you guys solved the case yet

― The Silent Extreme (Shakey Mo Collier), Friday, January 6, 2012 11:13 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

yeah, Graysmith did it.

either him or Gyllenhall's dad.

Oh man now I want a screenplay where Graysmith is the Zodiac killer and uses his SF Chron job to throw everyone off.

what if Graysmith was the real author of the letter that got Toschi demoted?

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-tuAzsKGELpo/TrLSMikT6nI/AAAAAAAADZ8/H3DTLuBOyRE/s1600/JFK5.jpg

have you seen the unabomber as Z theory it'll blow your minds bros

That theory is kind of fun, even if it's not true. The handwriting similarities, location coincidences etc make it tempting.

I love the turn this thread has taken.

i need to see the remix of Zodiac where they whip the mask off him at the end and it turns out it was the janitor

rooby rooby rooooOOOoO

still not gonna see that dragon tattoo, benjamin button neither

― lag∞n, Thursday, January 5, 2012 1:12 AM (Yesterday) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

otm

― johnny crunch, Friday, January 6, 2012 5:18 PM (3 weeks ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

lol i watched that dragon tattoo last nite, p ok if u dont think abt it too much, just let it wash over you

btw why are you all zodiac killer experts

y'all expert zodiac killahs

btw good review, still not watching

haha

a major plot point is at some point its revealed that the girls is super hot

sry is that a spoiler

I worked on The Game. Because of the English first AD we regularly referred to him as 'Fincha'.

this movie really is a lot like JFK

Zodiac that is

whichever one we think is best?

gdamn xp

http://s3.amazonaws.com/criterion-production/release_images/3968/627_box_348x490_BD.jpg?1339786418

for Fincher (and Alien3) fans, some amazing stuff right here

http://www.cinephiliabeyond.org/take-all-of-the-responsibility-because-youre-going-to-get-all-of-the-blame/

Zodiac - the only one in which the art direction means something.

^Alfred nuts

Saw a rep screening of Seven tonight--I don't think the second time, but (like An Unmarried Woman the other day) the first time since a year or two of its release.

All that time hasn't really changed my view: efficient, but fundamentally nasty (in a way that Zodiac isn't for me), and also, with Kevin Spacey's big monologue in the car, kind of obvious. The best moment is when Spacey turns up at the station and turns himself in. Can't imagine ever seeing it again.

would’ve voted for The Game