
There's more than one way to lose your life to a killer
Plot outline
Personal notes
Cast
- Jake Gyllenhaal
- Mark Ruffalo
- Anthony Edwards
- Robert Downey Jr.
- Brian Cox
- John Carroll Lynch
- Richmond Arquette
- Bob Stephenson
- John Lacy
- Chloë Sevigny
- Ed Setrakian
- John Getz
- John Terry
- Candy Clark
- Elias Koteas
- Dermot Mulroney
- Donal Logue
- June Diane Raphael
- Ciara Moriarty
- Lee Norris
- Patrick Scott Lewis
- Pell James
- Philip Baker Hall
- David Lee Smith
- Jason Wiles
- Charles Schneider
- James Carraway
- Tom Verica
- Jimmi Simpson
- Doan Ly
- Karina Logue
- Joel Bissonnette
- Zach Grenier
- John Mahon
- Matt Winston
- Jules Bruff
- John Ennis
- J. Patrick McCormack
- Adam Goldberg
- James Le Gros
- Charles Fleischer
- Clea DuVall
- Paul Schulze
- Adam Trese
- Penny Wallace
- John Hemphill
- Michel Francoeur
- Thomas Kopache
- Giovanna Spuria
- Barry Livingston
- Christopher John Fields
- Stanley B. Herman
- Hayati Akbas
- Martin Andris
- David Winston Barge
- Marlo Bernier
- Felix J. Boyle
- Geoff Callan
- Brad Carr
- Cabran E. Chamberlain
- Cookie Crawford
- JD Cullum
- Rod Damer
- Francois Dominick
- Judith Drake
- Carter Evans
- Mark Falvo
- Mitchell Fink
- Erica Ford
- Ted Garcia
- Gloria Grant
- Benjamin Hartnell
- Bryan C. Hartnell
- Jonathan Hartnell
- Monica Hartnell
- Tish Hicks
- Phoebe Holston
- Michael Hungerford
- Janis Jones
- Roy Lee Jones
- Anna Katarina
- Barry LeBrock
- Emily Lineham
- Marty Lodge
- Danielle McKee
- E.P. McKnight
- Jim McNichols
- Cazimir Milostan
- Betty Murphy
- Dave Nemeth
- Derris Nile
- James Joseph O'Neil
- Jeff Daniel Phillips
- Carmen Plumb
- David Alan Poe
- Peter Quartaroli
- Brett Rickaby
- Michael Rose
- Jack Samson
- John Sarno
- Micah Sauers
- Zachary Sauers
- Bill Seward
- Matthew Shields
- Ione Skye
- Callie Thompson
- Cooper Thornton
- April Vancelette
- Cassius M. Willis
- Shane Woodson
Plots
In the late 1960s/early 1970s, a San Francisco cartoonist becomes an amateur detective obsessed with tracking down the Zodiac Killer, an unidentified individual who terrorizes Northern California with a killing spree.
A serial killer in the San Francisco Bay Area taunts police with his letters and cryptic messages. We follow the investigators and reporters in this lightly fictionalized account of the true 1970's case as they search for the murderer, becoming obsessed with the case. Based on Robert Graysmith's book, the movie's focus is the lives and careers of the detectives and newspaper people.
Robert Graysmith is a cartoonist who works for the San Francisco Chronicle. His quirky ways irritate Paul Avery, a reporter whose drinking gets in the way of doing his job. The two become friends thanks to a shared interest: the Zodiac killer. Graysmith steadily becomes obsessed with the case, as Avery's life spirals into drunken oblivion. Graysmith's amateur sleuthing puts him onto the path of David Toschi, a police inspector who has thus far failed to catch his man; Sherwood Morrill, a handwriting expert; Linda del Buono, a convict who knew one of the Zodiac's victims; and others. Graysmith's job, his wife and his children all become unimportant next to the one thing that really matters: catching the Zodiac.