Salutations, traveler of The Internets! Welcome to William's Bloody Hell, so named after our founder, Sir Bloody William.
He is seen in the likeness above in a rare, 19th century woodcut. This
image was rumoured to have been
commissioned after a bout of unpleasantness
in the White Chapel district of London. Do enjoy your stay and peruse our many, varied offerings, much of which cannot be found elsewhere!
:: The Zodiac ::
by William the Bloody
This is the Zodiac speaking... In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the San Francisco area was plagued by a serial murderer who called himself the Zodiac. He attacked couples in secluded areas and shot a cab driver all the while sending taunting letters to the police departments and news papers of the areas. The Zodiac sent them all mysterious ciphers which promised clues to his identity. Political cartoonist Robert Graysmith is the central character to this particular telling of the true crime story, as he was working for one of the papers the Zodiac often wrote to, the San Francisco Chronicle. Graysmith had no real reason to be researching the Zodiac crimes being a cartoonist and all, but he was in the room when the editor opened that first letter from the killer and it was a case which would haunt him, much like the police working the case.
The Good: Remember the movie The Black Dahlia? Well, if you can translate how much that movie sucked for a film based on an actual crime and miraculously turn it into awsomeness, then you'd have Zodiac. I'm quite familiar with the Zodiac case, what with him being my favourite serial killer and all, so I was compelled to see this movie despite all my fears that it would disappoint me. It, however, did not (see previous testament to awesomemness). The film begins with the Fourth of July shooting of Darlene Ferrin and Michael Mageau, in a superb move which follows the couple earlier in the evening until they are shot at in the golf course parking lot. Shortly thereafter, the letters to the papers start coming in, and the killer claims credit for another murder last Christmas in another town. The movie does a great job portraying the time period not only with the news room's typewriters and rotary phones, but also with the police departments of different jurisdictions having difficulty comparing and sharing information (re: San Francisco, a big city, has a police department equipped with a fax machine, but none of the small town PDs do) which notably hindered their investigation. I would also like to note the terrific casting job all around on this one. Seriously, bravo. Jake Gyllenhaal as Graysmith does a great job. You can really see how he gets pulled into solving the mystery of the Zodiac's identity regardless of what it costs him personally. But really, all of the police officers, the reporters, etc were all superbly cast and did great jobs. The direction is good too, using neat camera angles and positions for the Zodiac murder scenes. But one of the best scenes in the film is the police interview with prime suspect Arthur Leigh Allen. Wow, you could feel the intensity of that moment.
The Bad: The movie runs rather long, clocking in at about two and a half hours. Your butt will be moaning by the end. Also, I had to arch an eyebrow that no mention was made of the "radian theory." Being a Zodiac... erm... "enthusiast", I know that in one letter the Zodiac mentions using radians (an angle of measurement relative to the radius of a circle. Re: 2pi rad = 360 degrees) positioned with Mount Diablo as the circle's center to calculate the murder sites. This could be a possible explanation for why the Zodiac had the cab driver he murdered drive to his particular destination before shooting him (it also pushed the "Zodiac had a military background" theory, which was an angle being pursued because of a shoeprint, but the shoeprint WAS mentioned, so okay). I can only assume that this radian theory was not mentioned in the film because Robert Graysmith, whose book the film is based upon, dismissed the theory when it was presented to him. Tch. I was mildly surprised that nothing was said about the copycat who sprang up in New York City in the 1990s, but that jerk doesn't really matter anyway.
All in all, this movie is what I go in hoping every true crime based film will be like, only they usually aren't, so I was quite happy indeed. It was all based in and revolved around the case facts which is the way these things should be done. The end credits show a list of consultants as long as my leg up to and including the actual detective who worked the case in San Francisco, so good show you guys. Good show. A must-see for Zodiac and true crime fans.
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