The Zodiac Killer: The Film that Tried to Catch a Killer

It was sort of like the play within Hamlet devised to make the king betray himself. In 1971, the Bay Area was like Whitechapel circa 1888. Fear of a serial killer stalking the streets had good people hiding in their homes. Restauranteur Tom Hanson had the novel idea of using a quickie exploitation film to trick the Zodiac into revealing himself. It sounds crazy, because it was, but the killer’s preoccupation with his media coverage was well-established by that point. Hanson is certain he met the Zodiac face-to-face during the film’s initial one-week run in San Francisco, but he could never prove it (at least not yet). The behind-the-scenes story is truly stranger than fiction, but the film itself is mostly a weird artifact of exploitation cinema. Freshly restored by the American Genre Film Archive (AGFA), Hanson’s The Zodiac Killer (trailer here) releases today on BluRay.

Perversely, the first half-hour of Zodiac 1971 seems intentionally designed to foster sympathy for the Zodiac, by making the residents of San Francisco appear so repugnant, we wouldn’t mind watching them get bumped off. However, around about the second act, we learn Jerry, the vegetarian, rabbit-keeping postal carrier is in fact the Zodiac, who kills for both satanic and Freudian reasons. He is a little upset when Grover, the misogynistic, dope-addicted deadbeat dad with an appallingly bad toupee takes credit for the Zodiac murders. This rather pushes him even further off the edge.

By any rational aesthetic standard, Hanson’s Zodiac is a rough go. It is sort of like watching America’s Most Wanted re-enactments directed by Harold P. Warren, of Manos: The Hands of Fate fame. Yet, it terms of historical significance, it deserves to be preserved on the Library of Congress’s National Film Registry. Frankly, it is hard to separate the film from its origins and context. Indeed, it is impossible to watch each head-shakingly awkward scene and not wonder what the Zodiac thought of it.

Considering the severity of Hanson’s budget constraints and the on-the-fly nature of the production, Hal Reed (probably best known for The Doberman Gang) and Bob Jones are better than you might expect, as Jerry the Zodiac and Grover the creep, respectively. This is definitely on the low end of the exploitation scale, yet it has a sinister energy you can’t quantify, but viewers will immediately pick up on. In terms of tone, it is sort of like three-parts Herschell Gordon Lewis’s Blood Feast (mostly sans the gore) and one-part Charles Pierce’s original The Town that Dreaded Sundown.

Ray Cantrell & Manny Cardoza’s screenplay is often fanciful, but the most terrifying thing about the film is how much was true, particularly the fact the Zodiac remains at large. This might be the rare film that would be better as the subject of someone else’s film rather than as a viewing experience to savor and repeat. Still, you have to give Hanson credit. He hatched an utterly insane scheme that maybe came mind-blowingly close to succeeding. Perhaps he should take the film on tour. The San Francisco police never closed the case and the FBI is still taking regular tips. Regardless, Hanson’s The Zodiac Killer is a unique piece of cultural history, so it is nice to have it preserved and available on BluRay, from AGFA and Something Weird.

SF Indie Fest ’17: Americana

Avery Wells is in the movie business, but he still has a conscience. Granted, he is a film editor rather than a big star or producer, but we should take what we can get. Unfortunately, his deep-seated guilt has forced him to retreat into the bottle. A chance at redemption will have tragic repercussions in Zachary Shedd’s Bay Area noir Americana (trailer here), which screens during the 2017 San Francisco Independent Film Festival.

Ever since the fatal accident, Wells has been largely drinking himself into oblivion in his Northern California cabin, until producer Calib Andrews practically abducts him. Drying out Wells, Andrews hires him to recut his troubled film Americana, starring Wells’ own sister Kate, who happened to be in his car the night he ran over a young boy. Just when Wells starts to get on with his life, a relative of the victim commits an act of truly Biblical revenge that sends him spirally down again. However, a couple of well-placed questions lead Wells to suspect the motives of his closest associates.

Clearly, Shedd has spent a great deal of time studying 1970s neo-noirs like De Palma’s Obsession. He and cinematographer Justin Charles Foster get the look and form right, but the substance is thin. Even with the Shedd’s suggestively Spartan approach to storytelling, his narrative is rather sleight and his twists are not difficult to anticipate. Still, he fully capitalizes on the San Francisco locations, without summoning disruptive memories of Hitchcock’s Vertigo, which is really quite a feat to pull off.

As Wells, David Call broods and implodes with admirable conviction. Kelli Garner projects a sense of vulnerability tinged with darkness that works perfectly for sister Kate and gives viewers an idea why she was cast as Marilyn Monroe in the Lifetime miniseries we will probably never see. Jack Davenport and Peter Coyote add the sort of roguish color and sharp elbows that well suits its Hollywood power players.

Americana features strong performances by the entire ensemble and it is finely polished. However, it just never really gets very far. Basically, it makes noir feel small and slow. Recommended only for Bay Area film boosters who will forgive its predictability, Americana screens Saturday (2/4) and Wednesday (2/8), as part of this year’s SF Indie Fest.

Sudden Fear: Joan Crawford and Jack Palance in Romantic San Francisco

Myra Hudson is a hit Broadway playwright by day and a wealthy San Francisco heiress-socialite by night—or vice versa. Lester Blaine is a talented stage actor, but he makes better dough as a smooth-talking adventurer. Hudson fires Blaine from her next box office triumph because she does not believe he is seductive enough, but then falls hopelessly under his spell. However, when Hudson discovers her husband’s true nature things get classically noir in David Miller’s digitally restored Sudden Fear (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York.

Hudson is used to getting her way, so she pulls her playwright’s prerogative and cans Blaine during rehearsals. Blaine is used to having his way, so he seduces Hudson when they both happen to find themselves on the same train bound Frisco. At first, they seem like a happy couple, despite their awkward history and vintage early 1950s separate sleeping quarters. However, when Blaine’s femme fatale ex Irene Neves shows up, she threatens to destabilize everything. They have some rather scandalous personal and professional history together, but the worst part is Blaine is still hung up on her.

Neves has been toying with Junior Kearney, the son and junior partner of Myra Blaine nee Hudson’s attorney and has discovered some very alarming news about her will. Ironically, she intended to add codicils that would do right by Mr. Blaine, but the two fortune hunters never haear about that. However, thanks to the heiress-playwright’s automatic dictation machine, she knows they intend to kill her over the weekend, before she can sign on the dotted line on Monday. Cat-and-mouse business duly commences.

It seems a bit strange Sudden Fear is not more widely remembered, because it is a nifty little thriller that earned Joan Crawford an Oscar nomination for a classically overwrought (in a good way) Joan Crawford performance. Let’s just say she does not handle the discovery of Blaine’s betrayal well at all. Of course, it is great fun to watch her segue from twitchy meltdown to stone cold resolve.

Yet, Jack Palance (also Oscar nominated for what was only his third film role) is an equally big screen presence as Blaine. He is lunky and sinister, but there is also something sympathetically vulnerable about him. In contrast, Gloria Grahame’s Neves is just pure unadulterated bad news. A young Mike Connors is serviceable enough playing as Junior Kearney, while he was still billed as “Touch Connors” (MST3K fans will remember that unfortunate stage name from Swamp Diamonds, with Beverly Garland). For extra added footnote interest, the senior Kearney is played by Bruce Bennett (a.k.a. Herman Brix), an Olympic shot put silver medalist, who was originally slated to play Tarzan in the Weissmuller-MGM franchise and would assume the role in a dodgy independent production loosely affiliated with Edgar Rice Burroughs. He’s fine too.

Crawford and Palance both do their thing, which guarantees Sudden Fear will be good back-stabbing fun. Miller was something of a studio journeyman, but he shows flashes of stylish inspiration throughout the 1952 film. He also shrewdly capitalizes on the San Francisco-Northern California locales, sometimes giving the audience flashbacks (or rather flashforwards) to Hitchcock’s 1958 classic, Vertigo. It is a juicy dark thriller that deserves a second lease on critical life. Highly recommended, Sudden Fear opens this Friday (8/12) in New York, at Film Forum.

Man from Reno: Murder, She Alluringly Wrote

Mystery novelist Aki Akahori’s Inspector Takabe is like a Japanese Maigret, but her life is about to turn into a Mary Higgins Clark novel, except darker. A chance encounter with a seductive stranger leads to more intrigue than Akahori bargained for in Dave Boyle’s Man from Reno (trailer here), the best narrative award winner at the 2014 L.A. Film Festival, which opens this Friday in New York.

Although Takabe rules the Japanese bestseller lists, Akahori is uncomfortable with her success. Tired of her celebrity status, she deserts her publicity tour, taking refuge in San Francisco, where she once went to school. In her hotel, she meets a handsome Japanese tourist from Reno, or so she deduces. She did not have a tryst in mind, but she eventually yields to his charms. However, just when things start heating up, he precipitously vanishes. Even more disconcerting are the total strangers who suddenly want to take a quick look-see in her room for who-knows-what.

Just north of town, Paul Del Moral, the sheriff of San Marco, is also searching for a Japanese man. In this case, it is the individual he accidentally hit during severe fog-in, who up and left the hospital in a suspiciously rash manner. Soon a dead body turns up in San Marco who seems to have some connection to the fellow Del Moral dubbed “Running Man.” Inevitably, Del Moral’s investigation will lead him to San Francisco and the increasingly uneasy Akahori.

Reno represents a quantum step up for Boyle, whose previous films, like White on Rice, have been largely classifiable as romantic comedies. His frequent collaborator Hiroshi Watanabe is also back in the fold, but this time around he plays a strictly serious supporting role. Instead, Ayako Fujitani and veteran character actor Pepe Serna take star turns as Akahori and Del Moral, respectively. Expect to see more of them because they both make major statements with their smart, charismatic, yet understated performances.

As thrillers go, Reno (co-written by Boyle, Joel Clark, and Michael Lerman) has several fresh twists and it nicely captures the between-worlds vibe of the expatriate lifestyle. Technically polished, Richard Wong’s evocatively noir cinematographer also heightens the tension during several key scenes.

Murkier than one might expect, Reno is an effective somewhat romantic suspenser that never rushes to tip its hand. Yet, it even more appealing to see such a film anchored by people who look like Akahori and Del Moral. Granted, Fujitani is a beautiful woman, but in a mature, cerebral manner. Likewise, Serna is wonderfully grizzled, in a confidence-inspiring way. They are terrific, carrying the film relay-style during their many solo scenes. Highly recommended, Man from Reno opens this Friday (3/27) in New York, at the Regal E-Walk.