Zodiac, in the scheme of the cinema screenings, was kind of a return to normal hollywood cinema, familiar as opposed to the bizarre Holy Motors or the very artificial Life Aquatic. I love the sort of research-sudo-non-fiction (some people call them newspaper movies but I don’t know how I feel about that) genre like that of the recent Oscar Winning film, Spotlight (also starring Mark Ruffalo, perhaps he really likes these non-fiction roles). A key difference is the suspense element and I think the suspense feeds directly into the cinematography. Fincher is very deliberately creating an atmosphere of terror with these films especially in certain scenes (most notably the basement scene) where there isn’t any real danger.

Looking at the format of the film, many have stated that the film was shot entirely on digital formats but Fincher has since stated that the slow motion murder films were shot on high speed film stocks because the digital medium was not advanced enough to shoot at high speed with Full High Definition resolution. The film was later edited with DVCPro proxies. The film was shot on spherical lenses, unlike films of the period Zodiac is set within, this, as well as the aerial footage can make you forget that the film is set in the seventies as really the only cues are in the mise-en-scene.

The film’s use of perspective is also very typical. There aren’t a lot of 180 degree rule breaks and most two-character scenes are either composed with the two characters on either side of the shot or with over-the-shoulder shots. Even in the scene with Allen, the cops and the reporters the composition is very simple and effective. The perspective very rarely takes the form of one particular person in the shot and for the most part, the perspective only shifts between Paul and Robert.