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Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

67
$9.99
75
24 City
66
Adoration
74
Afghan Star
48
Alien Trespass
56
American Violet
82
Anvil! The Story of Anvil
57
Away We Go
81
Beaches of Agnes, The
62
Big Man Japan
28
Big Shot-Caller, The
78
Boys: The Sherman Brothers' Story, The
55
Brothers Bloom, The
82
Burma VJ: Reporting from a Closed Country
xx
Call of the Wild
63
Cheri
62
Cherry Blossoms
63
Dead Snow
65
Departures
18
Downloading Nancy
58
Easy Virtue
70
End of the Line, The
77
Every Little Step
64
Examined Life
80
Food, Inc.
38
Gigantic
56
Girl from Monaco, The
67
Girlfriend Experience, The
87
Gomorrah
89
Goodbye Solo
63
Great Buck Howard, The
79
Harvard Beats Yale 29-29
xx
Home
82
Hunger
91
Hurt Locker, The
16
I Hate Valentine's Day
81
Il Divo
54
Is Anybody There?
71
Jerichow
58
Julia
74
Lemon Tree
36
Life is Hot in Cracktown
40
Limits of Control, The
42
Little Ashes
64
Lymelife
50
Management
57
Merry Gentleman, The
66
Moon
35
New York
62
Not Forgotten
xx
Offshore
78
O'Horten
64
Outrage
40
Paris 36
54
Pontypool
71
Pressure Cooker
52
Quiet Chaos
83
Revanche
67
Rudo y Cursi
86
Seraphine
65
Sex Positive
70
Shall We Kiss?
77
Sin Nombre
59
Sleep Dealer
74
Song of Sparrows, The
54
Stoning of Soraya M., The
82
Sugar
84
Summer Hours
61
Sunshine Cleaning
28
Surveillance
42
Tennessee
63
Tetro
64
Throw Down Your Heart
80
Tokyo Sonata
63
Tokyo!
70
Tony Manero
74
Treeless Mountain
88
Tulpan
74
Two Lovers
83
Tyson
83
U2 3D
60
Under Our Skin
69
Unmistaken Child
69
Valentino: The Last Emperor
22
What Goes Up
45
Whatever Works
57
Youssou Ndour: I Bring What I Love
91
Hurt Locker, The
89
Goodbye Solo
88
Tulpan
87
Gomorrah
86
Seraphine
84
Summer Hours
83
U2 3D
83
Revanche
83
Tyson
82
Burma VJ: Reporting from a Closed Country
82
Sugar
82
Hunger
82
Anvil! The Story of Anvil
81
Il Divo
81
Beaches of Agnes, The
80
Food, Inc.
80
Tokyo Sonata
79
Harvard Beats Yale 29-29
78
Boys: The Sherman Brothers' Story, The
78
O'Horten
77
Every Little Step
77
Sin Nombre
75
24 City
74
Treeless Mountain
74
Afghan Star
74
Two Lovers
74
Song of Sparrows, The
74
Lemon Tree
71
Pressure Cooker
71
Jerichow
70
Shall We Kiss?
70
Tony Manero
70
End of the Line, The
69
Valentino: The Last Emperor
69
Unmistaken Child
67
$9.99
67
Rudo y Cursi
67
Girlfriend Experience, The
66
Adoration
66
Moon
65
Sex Positive
65
Departures
64
Outrage
64
Examined Life
64
Throw Down Your Heart
64
Lymelife
63
Tokyo!
63
Cheri
63
Dead Snow
63
Tetro
63
Great Buck Howard, The
62
Cherry Blossoms
62
Big Man Japan
62
Not Forgotten
61
Sunshine Cleaning
60
Under Our Skin
59
Sleep Dealer
58
Julia
58
Easy Virtue
57
Away We Go
57
Merry Gentleman, The
57
Youssou Ndour: I Bring What I Love
56
Girl from Monaco, The
56
American Violet
55
Brothers Bloom, The
54
Is Anybody There?
54
Pontypool
54
Stoning of Soraya M., The
52
Quiet Chaos
50
Management
48
Alien Trespass
45
Whatever Works
42
Little Ashes
42
Tennessee
40
Limits of Control, The
40
Paris 36
38
Gigantic
36
Life is Hot in Cracktown
35
New York
28
Big Shot-Caller, The
28
Surveillance
22
What Goes Up
18
Downloading Nancy
16
I Hate Valentine's Day
xx
Call of the Wild
xx
Home
xx
Offshore
Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
|
Zodiac
Paramount Pictures
FILM:
MPAA RATING: R for some strong killings, language, drug material and brief sexual images
Starring
Jake Gyllenhaal,
Mark Ruffalo,
Anthony Edwards,
Robert Downey Jr.,
Brian Cox,
John Carroll Lynch,
Chloë Sevigny,
and
Ed Setrakian
Based on the actual case files of one of the most intriguing unsolved crimes in the nation's history, Zodiac is a thriller from David Fincher, director of "Seven" and "Fight Club." As a serial killer terrifies the San Francisco Bay Area and taunts police with his ciphers and letters, investigators in four jurisdictions search for the murderer. The case will become an obsession for four men as their lives and careers are built and destroyed by the endless trail of clues. (Paramount Pictures)
| GENRE(S): |
Crime
|
Drama
|
Suspense/Thriller
|
| WRITTEN BY: |
James Vanderbilt
Robert Graysmith (book)
|
| DIRECTED BY: |
David Fincher
|
| RELEASE DATE: |
DVD: July 24, 2007
Theatrical: March 2, 2007
|
| RUNNING TIME: |
156 minutes, Color |
| ORIGIN: |
USA |

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
100
Village Voice
Nathan Lee
Zodiac exhausts more than one genre. Termite art par excellence, it burrows for the sake of burrowing, as fascinated by its own nooks and crannies as "Inland Empire."

100
Entertainment Weekly
Owen Gleiberman
Zodiac never veers from its stoically gripping, police-blotter tone, yet it begins to take on the quality of a dream.

100
The Onion (A.V. Club)
Scott Tobias
Zodiac is the rare serial-killer movie in which the psychosis stems as much from the pursuers (and the filmmaker) as the pursued.

100
TV Guide
Maitland McDonagh
Fincher gets it all right, and Donovan's hippie-dippy "Hurdy Gurdy Man," which bookends the story, has never sounded so hauntingly menacing.

100
Chicago Sun-Times
Roger Ebert
Its most impressive accomplishment is to gather a bewildering labyrinth of facts and suspicions over a period of years, and make the journey through this maze frightening and suspenseful.

91
Christian Science Monitor
Peter Rainer
In Zodiac, working from a script by James Vanderbilt, Fincher has decidedly toned down his act. His straight-ahead, methodical direction isn't as flagrantly unsettling as much of his previous work, but it's more psychologically layered. In this film, for the first time, we feel for his characters when they bleed.

91
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
William Arnold
An absorbing and fulfilling experience -- even though it ends with a question mark.

90
The New York Times
Manohla Dargis
Rarely has a film with so much blood on its hands seemed so insistently alive.

90
The Hollywood Reporter
Michael Rechtshaffen
Firing on all cylinders as a creepy thriller, police procedural and "All the President's Men"-style investigative newsroom drama, the smart, extremely vivid production oozes period authenticity.

90
Variety
Todd McCarthy
Conveying an astonishing array of information across a long narrative arc while still maintaining dramatic rhythm and tension, this adaptation of Robert Graysmith's bestseller reps by far director David Fincher's most mature and accomplished work.

90
LA Weekly
Scott Foundas
Zodiac may be the perfect meeting of filmmaker and subject -- an obsessive's portrait of obsession that is, finally, a monument to irresolution.

90
Time
Richard Corliss
Fincher, whose work on "Fight Club" and "Panic Room" displayed his expertise in melding the suspenseful and the lurid, plays it cool here. He lets his stars do their thing.

88
Charlotte Observer
Lawrence Toppman
Anyone who enjoys the novels of Ed McBain, the Oscar-winning "All the President's Men" or any televised variation of "CSI" will be at home here.

88
Chicago Tribune
Michael Phillips
It's fascinating and unexpected both in its simple, looming images and its storytelling priorities, which may not intersect with the priorities of audiences who couldn't get enough of "Se7en."

88
Philadelphia Inquirer
Carrie Rickey
Zodiac is a reproach both to those dedicated to unscrambling "The Da Vinci Code" and to those hooked on forensic crime shows where all the evidence leads to a tidy conclusion. That Zodiac's manhunt is inconclusive makes it all the more haunting.

88
Rolling Stone
Peter Travers
Unique and unmissable.

88
Premiere
Glenn Kenny
It makes for a daringly different kind of thriller -- cerebral, meticulous, haunting.

88
USA Today
Claudia Puig
This is the rare movie that blends long scenes of meticulous research with a sweeping story and sustains a feeling of riveting suspense. Zodiac grips you by the throat and doesn't let go.

88
New York Post
Lou Lumenick
This movie sends you into the night thinking, maybe even a little afraid. Bravo, Mr. Fincher.

83
Baltimore Sun
Michael Sragow
Like Brian De Palma's 1981 masterpiece "Blow-Out," this movie contains cutting perceptions of obsession, institutional and professional myopia, misplaced loyalty in experts, misreadings of evidence and the kind of confusion that leads to conspiracy theories. But Fincher's movie falls short of masterpiece status.

83
Portland Oregonian
Shawn Levy
It doesn't break ground like "Seven" or "Fight Club"; it's not a thrill ride like "Panic Room." But it's a mature, thoughtful and full-bodied movie that compensates for the demands it makes with the rewards of craftsmanship, rigor, skill and art.

80
Slate
Dana Stevens
To undertake a thriller of this length and scope with no prospect of a morally satisfying resolution, Fincher must have been a little nuts himself. We'll see whether audiences used to the tidy one-hour cases on "CSI" and "Law & Order" will follow him down Zodiac's murky, twisted, and ultimately dead-end street. It may not sound like it from that description, but it's a hell of a ride.

80
Film Threat
Pete Vonder Haar
The more unpleasant aspects of the case are minimized in favor of telling the story and highlighting the effects of the case on these four men. It drags in spots, but even if Fincher hasn't hit it out of the park, Zodiac is easily a stand-up triple.

80
Newsweek
David Ansen
The movie holds you in its grip from start to finish.

80
The New Yorker
David Denby
Zodiac is superbly made, but it's also a strange piece of work.

80
Empire
Kim Newman
This gripping character study becomes more agonisingly suspenseful as it gets closer to an answer that can't be confirmed.

75
Boston Globe
Wesley Morris
Zodiac is a kind of corrective remake of "Se7en," a renunciation of that earlier movie's psychotic nihilism. That rejection extends to a neat sight gag. Fincher gives us a shot of a cardboard cutout for "Dirty Harry" that mocks the personal abyss that catching Zodiac becomes.

75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
Liam Lacey
The most provocative aspect of this compulsive riddle is how it resists closure. The end comes not when we have the answer, but when the movie reaches its irresolute end.

75
Miami Herald
Rene Rodriguez
The straightforward approach is crucial, because the movie is constantly doling out so much information -- so many names and places and theories to keep track of -- that it borders on the overwhelming. Occasionally, it's a little dull, too.

75
ReelViews
James Berardinelli
The length and uneven pacing are stumbling blocks with which an audience must contend. Patient viewers will be rewarded; others may wish for something with less subtlety and more verve.

70
New York Magazine
David Edelstein
What begins like your basic police procedural becomes more and more choppy and diffuse. To a point, that’s intentional: Zodiac was never caught, and Fincher aims to creep you out with the lack of closure.

70
Los Angeles Times
Kevin Crust
Zodiac is primarily a complex character study, despite the film's grim and gruesome subject matter. It's a role reversal of sorts for a director who normally emphasizes the brutal tension in his movies.

70
The New Republic
Stanley Kauffmann
The picture tries hard for addictive mystery, but it is full of scenes that promise insight and don't deliver.

67
Austin Chronicle
Marjorie Baumgarten
At 2 1/2 hours, the film is too long in the telling and too short on suspense.

63
New York Daily News
Jack Mathews
Without a persuasive ending, Zodiac is an exercise in frustration if not futility. But before it hits the inevitable wall, it does something better than most genre films even attempt: it perfectly depicts the obsession that often overtakes cops and reporters involved in high-profile crimes.

50
Washington Post
Stephen Hunter
That's exactly the problem with this movie: It's not about a killer, or his victims, or the manhunt or the cops. They're all in it, of course, more or less. But it's about a writer.

50
Chicago Reader
Jonathan Rosenbaum
In some ways, for better and for worse, this is even more about Graysmith (Jake Gyllehaal)--who became obsessed with solving the Zodiac killings that terrorized northern California in the late 60s--than about the murderer.

50
Salon.com
Stephanie Zacharek
Bits of the picture are fascinating to look at, but eventually, exhaustion kicks in, to the point where we're not sure what we're looking at, or why.

50
San Francisco Chronicle
Mick LaSalle
Never takes off, but it never collapses. At times, it becomes frustrating -- for example, about 30 minutes are spent pursuing a lead that goes nowhere.

50
Wall Street Journal
Joe Morgenstern
The film feels self-obsessed, an intriguing drama that slowly devolves into a bleak meditation on the absence of dramatics.

The average user rating for this movie is 7.6 (out of 10) based on 139 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
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