On Location with Zodiac

David Fincher in foreground, with Jake Gyllenhaal behind, and what appears to be the top right portion of Brad Fischer's head.

I believe David Fincher's finished filming Zodiac on location in San Francisco, and now should have started up back in LA. I haven't heard any recent detains from my dad, him being half way around the world, but I stumbled across this article the other day about the filming of the Zodiac movie based on his books:



Pictured here are Robert Downey Jr. as Paul Avery, and Jake Gyllenhaal as Robert Graysmith.

The Zodiac case surrounded a big part of my childhood. Well, at least the weekend part of my childhood, when we'd see dad. Climb into his orange VW Rabbit and head out to Lake Berryessa or Vallejo, possibly driving the same routes Zodiac had. Going to flea markets, movie theaters, and hardware stores all to eyeball possible suspects. It was an obsession for dad. I'm thinking of writing my own account, Growing Up Zodiac.

As a kid, I remember meeting Detective Dave Toschi. He'd come by the apartment to see dad. He even showed me his specially designed holster. Toschi was also a technical consultant on Streets of San Francisco, and an inspiration for the character Dirty Harry, which was based on the Zodiac case.

Pictures courtesy of the San Francisco Chronicle.
Photographed by Carlos Avila Gonzalez & Susan Ehmer