David Fincher’s Zodiac (2007), written by producer James Vanderbilt and adapted from the true crime works of Robert Graysmith, remains one of the most respected films of the early twenty-first century. As the second film featuring a serial killer (and the first based on fact) by Fincher, Zodiac remains a standout in a varied but stylistically unified career. While connected to this genre, the film also hybridizes the policier genre and the investigative reporter film. And yet, scholarship has largely ignored the film. This collection is the first book-length work of criticism dedicated to the film. Section One focuses on early influences, while the second section analyzes the film’s unique treatment of narrative. The book closes with a section focusing on game theory, data and hegemony, the Zodiac’s treatment in music, and the use of sound in cinema. By offering new avenues and continuing a few established ones, this book will interest scholars of cinema and true crime along with fans and enthusiasts in these areas.

David Fincher: Mind Games is the definitive critical and visual survey of the Academy Award– and Golden Globe–nominated works of director David Fincher. From feature films Alien 3, Se7en, The Game, Fight Club, Panic Room, Zodiac, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, The Social Network, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, Gone Girl, and Mank through his MTV clips for Madonna and the Rolling Stones and the Netflix series House of Cards and Mindhunter, each chapter weaves production history with original critical analysis, as well as with behind the scenes photography, still-frames, and original illustrations from Little White Lies' international team of artists and graphic designers. Mind Games also features interviews with Fincher's frequent collaborators, including Jeff Cronenweth, Angus Wall, Laray Mayfield, Holt McCallany, Howard Shore and Erik Messerschmidt. Grouping Fincher's work around themes of procedure, imprisonment, paranoia, prestige and relationship dynamics, Mind Games is styled as an investigation into a filmmaker obsessed with investigation, and the design will shift to echo case files within a larger psychological profile.

From the Bestselling Author of 'Zodiac' , 'Auto Focus' and 'Black Fire'. DAVID FINCHER WAS AFTER THE TRUTH. WITHOUT IT, HE WOULD NOT SHOOT ZODIAC. For nearly two decades, Hollywood had been trying to make a movie of Zodiac, and for nearly two decades, it had failed. In 2003, producer Brad Fischer, and screenwriter Jamie Vanderbilt attempted the undoable, and set their sights on the one filmmaker they felt unequalled for the helm: director David Fincher (Se7en, Fight Club). Fincher’s eye for detail, probing mind, and unrelenting quest for answers made him ideal. His personal connection to the case made him perfect. From Hollywood boardrooms to remote fog-shrouded crime scenes, they battle a huge script that refuses to be beaten, a case that refuses to be solved, and a running time and budget that threaten their film. Follow as they track down missing witnesses, gather the original investigators, visit the original crime scenes, discover boxes of Zodiac case files from an attic, unearth new clues, a videotape of the prime suspect’s police interrogation, and a surviving victim who doesn’t want to be found. To keep Fincher on board, and get their film greenlit, it will take cold leads, private eyes, new evidence, and most of all, perseverance. “He’s hooked. If he doesn’t make the film, he’ll solve the case.” —Detective Ken Narlow “SOMETHING DRAWS THE GIRL’S attention,” David Fincher said. The maverick director paused at the spot along the shore Captain Ken Narlow had indicated. Something was not right. Fincher looked down at the rocky ground and the steep slope of the rotting tree as if he had not seen them before. Without a word he wheeled and walked some distance around to the adjacent peninsula. The retired detectives watched the celebrated filmmaker follow the curve of land and circle to a little inlet on the other bank. His head was down as he took long, athletic strides. Suddenly, he knelt and studied the ground. He picked up a fistful of earth, let it drift between his fingers, and watched as the wind carried the reddish particles away. He looked up at the road high above where the victims’ car had been found, then looked back at the tree. Next, he tossed a few rocks in the air and gazed to the center of the lake where it was a couple hundred feet deep. Fincher wondered what other mysteries might be buried there. Further up, underneath the dam at Devil’s Gate, was the narrow point of Putah Creek. Fincher returned from his scouting trip and made an announcement. His voice was confident and clear, ringing out over the lake. “The other side of the little island out there is much more vertical than this side,” he said. “I think that is the actual murder site.” “Let’s go over and take a look,” Narlow said and started north with Jamie Vanderbilt. “I’m not one hundred percent convinced this is the place.” When Narlow reached the other side of the inlet, he clapped a hand to his forehead and then hailed Fincher and the rest of the men across the water. “My God!” he hollered, “I took you to the wrong spot!” In that arcane way he had of penetrating to the heart of a riddle, Fincher had discerned the truth. He became quiet as he began working the puzzle of the open taxi door, the blood that should have been elsewhere, a bloody print that belonged to no one, and the shot nobody heard. “David’s considered one of the touchiest and weirdest directors by executives, but as a writer I consider him the nicest and most normal of them all. But maybe the same thing that is wrong with him is wrong with me.” —Jamie Vanderbilt, screenwriter

Robert Graysmith’s New York Times bestselling account of the desperate hunt for a serial killer and his own investigation of California’s unsolved Zodiac murders. A sexual sadist, the Zodiac killer took pleasure in torture and murder. His first victims were a teenage couple, stalked and shot dead in a lovers’ lane. After another slaying, he sent his first mocking note to authorities, promising he would kill more. The official tally of his victims was six. He claimed thirty-seven dead. The real toll may have reached fifty. Robert Graysmith was on staff at the San Francisco Chronicle in 1969 when Zodiac first struck, triggering in the resolute reporter an unrelenting obsession with seeing the hooded killer brought to justice. In this gripping account of Zodiac’s eleven-month reign of terror, Graysmith reveals hundreds of facts previously unreleased, including the complete text of the killer’s letters.

Robert Graysmith reveals the true identity of Zodiac—America's most elusive serial killer. Between December 1968 and October 1969 a hooded serial killer called Zodiac terrorized San Francisco. Claiming responsibility for thirty-seven murders, he manipulated the media with warnings, dares, and bizarre cryptograms that baffled FBI code-breakers. Then as suddenly as the murders began, Zodiac disappeared into the Bay Area fog. After painstaking investigation and more than thirty years of research, Robert Graysmith finally exposes Zodiac’s true identity. With overwhelming evidence he reveals the twisted private life that led to the crimes, and provides startling theories as to why they stopped. America’s greatest unsolved mystery has finally been solved. INCLUDES PHOTOS AND A COMPLETE REPRODUCTION OF ZODIAC’S LETTERS

An explosive and historic book of true crime and an emotionally powerful and revelatory memoir of a man whose ten-year search for his biological father leads to a chilling discovery: His father is one of the most notorious-and still at large-serial killers.

Compares Once were warriors with other films that have similar themes.