David Fincher’s brilliant Zodiac suggested that the unsolved mystery of the San Francisco serial killings of the late 1960s and early ’70s could be penned on suspect Arthur Leigh Allen. Wrong! According to Tom Hanson’s The Zodiac Killer, the murderer was just that mailman named Jerry — you know, the hick one who lives with … Continue reading The Zodiac Killer (1971)
Like David Fincher’s Zodiac, Jeremy Hoenack‘s Killer’s Delight draws from case files and follows San Francisco police detectives in search of a real-life serial killer. Here, the maniac in question — based shoelace-loosely on Ted Bundy — clearly has a type: beautiful teenage girls hitchhiking home from bowling alleys and public pools. After use and abuse, … Continue reading Killer’s Delight (1978)
Through no real fault of his own, Michael Fassbender’s past decade hasn’t exactly been stellar. His standout performances in Steve McQueen’s Shame (2011) and 12 Years a Slave (2013) came close to making him a household name. That is, until he was unable to save a trilogy of lackluster misses in 2016 with X-Men: Apocalypse, … Continue reading The Killer (2023)
While the identity of the Zodiac Killer remains unknown, several popular theories connect him to men who since have passed away. But when has that ever stopped Hollywood from exploiting an exploitable concept? No stranger to other wacky “what if”s on the silver screen, San Francisco’s notorious serial killer of the late 1960s and early … Continue reading Awakening the Zodiac (2017)
Beginning with the oft-told anecdote of director Tobe Hooper fantasizing about crowd control via a certain gasoline-powered tool during a hectic holiday rush at Montgomery Ward (and thus planting the seeds that soon sprouted into an eventual horror classic), Joseph Lanza’s The Texas Chain Saw Massacre: The Film That Terrified a Rattled Nation is hardly … Continue reading The Texas Chain Saw Massacre: The Film That Terrified a Rattled Nation