Nothing Fantastic But Still A Very Enjoyable Thriller

Rating: 6/10 (10 July 2015)

Zodiac ticks all the boxes for a very good mystery crime thriller...a great cast, nicely filmed, and well written. Unfortunately, the "decent pace" box cannot be checked as I found the film to be just a bit too slow, and I actually found myself struggling not to nod off about halfway through. Thankfully, the film maintained enough interest later on to alleviate all desire to fall asleep completely.
The film start's off decently enough with a nice, steady developing story with an adequate pace that we're accustomed to seeing in a thriller of this type, but after about an hour or so, nothing much picks up and it felt as if it just trudged on for a good while until picking up again within the last 45 minutes.
I must say that one thing that did impress me about the movie was the attention to detail Fincher put into trying to recreate an accurate telling of the Zodiac case. I mean yes there were fictionalised parts (the Graysmith/Avery friendship for one), but any director who spends 18 months researching the case, interviewing countless people including witnesses, family members, former detectives, and even suspects, and goes to the trouble of having trees flown in to make a particular landmark look the way it did 40 years prior deserves recognition for attempted accuracy. Films like this, Se7en, The Game, and Panic Room proved he was capable of being much more than just a music video director.
The film's cast is fantastic with Gyllenhaal, Ruffalo, Edwards, and Downey Jr. all giving great performances, especially Downey Jr., who I'm not a fan of but was excellent here, and Gyllenhaal who continues to get better and better with the different roles he plays (check out Nighcrawler & Southpaw for more evidence of this).
In saying all of that, is Zodiac a great film? No, but it IS a very good film and it's definitely worth a watch if you enjoy films of this type.