Bideodromage
The serial predator and killer Martin Vanger appears in both the American and Swedish iterations of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. He is equally disquieting in both. Peter Haber portrays Vanger in the 2009 Swedish release, and Stellan SkarsgΓ₯rd does the honors for the 2011 American film. Both performances are brilliant, and chilling. Haber’s portrayal is earnest and volatile, while SkarsgΓ₯rd is more haughty, detached, dispassionate. Both work perfectly.
The Zodiac Killer was active—as far as we know—in 1968 and 1969, though he claimed in one of his notorious, cryptic, and, really, legendary, letters that he had killed (and was continuing to kill…) many more than the law department could conceive of. His five “canonical” murders were unusual in a number of ways: his “signature” varied from event to event; and instead of trying to conceal his deeds, he boasted and rodomontaded unabashedly and very publicly. When he gloated that he planned to kill schoolchildren as they “came bouncing out” of a schoolbus, panic ran rampant throughout the whole of Northern California.
The initial scene shows the strikingly cryptic, bizarre, haunting interview that Toschi {portrayed by Mark Ruffalo}, Mulanax {Elias Koteas} and Armstrong {Anthony Edwards} held with Person of Interest Arthur Leigh Allen {played by John Carroll Lynch, who gets it pitch-perfect}. By turns haughty, indignant, angry, and laconic, Allen kept dropping revealing, tantalising bits of information that certainly got the lawmen’s attention. They glance at each other, almost in shock, as the suspect all but reveals that he’s the infamous Zodiac. But not quite. An extremely intense scene.
The middle two videos cover one of the “canonical” Zodiac murders, and some of writer/sleuth Robert Graysmith’s unnerving detours into what may, or may not be false leads, this being a particularly disquieting episode with Bob Vaughn (Charles Fleischer).
The final video shows Robert Graysmith (Jake Gyllenhaal) as he enters the domain of Leigh, not to prove anything, but to look into his eyes “and know he’s the one”. He does so, and as it dawns on the chief suspect of the Zodiac investigation what is happening, his countenance morphs from pleasant, to menacing and cold.
This riveting film focuses, for the most part, on the remarkable degree of not only fear, but *obsession* that the never-caught serial killer instilled in people. This kind of obsession destroyed a number of lives; Paul Avery {Robert Downey, Jr.}, Dave Toschi {Mark Ruffalo}, and Robert Graysmith {Jake Gyllenhaal} are those examined in Zodiac.
The brilliant character actor Pruitt Taylor Vince gives an extremely memorable performance as serial killer/lobotomist Gerry Schnauz in this moving {and eerie} episode of The X-Files.
Slightly off-kilter character actor Doug Hutchison was THE *perfect* choice to play CSI Nick Stokes’s rather creepy antagonist in this episode of CSI, season 2, episode 19.
Brilliant performances—both very low-key, but extremely effective—by Ned Beatty and Taylor Nichols, which really get across what a sociopath is: for one thing, they generally don’t stand out. And, of course, there are other qualities….
Bideodromage 