FINCHER VS. FINCHER

There's an interesting article on Slate.com about the David Fincher movie Zodiac, which comes out in a 2DVD Director's Cut edition tomorrow. The writer argues that Fincher, in making the movie about the slogging police work that led to the ultimate non-resolution of the case (rather than making it more dramatic than it really was), is critiquing the traditional Hollywood version of police work. I would argue, though, that Zodiac is more like Fincher critiquing himself - specifically, his breakthrough film, Se7en. That movie's been so thoroughly aped and absorbed into pop culture, from the TV series Millennium (the pilot episode of which was basically a made-for-TV version) to eight million knockoff supernatural-supergenius-serial-killer movies, never mind its influence on music videos, etc., etc., that I wouldn't be at all surprised to learn that Fincher views it, at least in part, as a Frankenstein's monster that grew way out of his control. And by doing a resolutely low-key, head-down, ultimately futile and kinda depressing (realistically depressing, not the showy bleakness of Se7en) movie like Zodiac, he's both countering and atoning for his own earlier, more glib and less thoughtful work.