note: this is a repost of one my Reviews from Aug 9th, 2008.

Detective David Mills (Brad Pitt) is a youngster that has just transferred into the New York City’s homicide division. Detective Lt. William Somerset (Morgan Freeman) is the experienced homicide detective that has been partnered with Mills for his final week before he retires. As Mills enters the city and starts work at the same time a new serial killer starts his work using the seven deadly sins as the overall theme for his murders.

Here is one of those movies that I am semi-embarrassed to say that I am yet to see. It is so amazing, and it features so many great themes, visuals, dialogue, and a great plot twist that not many people will see till a couple moments before Fincher shows us. I’ve been a David Fincher fan ever since a friend of mine who forced me to sit through “Fight Club” a few years ago. And when I told him “I don’t get it” he made me watch it again the following day and I loved it.

Personally I think this movie is Fincher playing target practice for his more subtle direction style, which we saw a much better version of with “Zodiac”. I wasn’t too amazed with the movie at first. It made me feel like a much better filmed police movie, which had a lot cooler idea for a serial killer. And when I use the word “cooler” I really mean flashy, it sticks out and makes you feel like you need to keep watching.

One thing I must say though is that this movie did not hit that high note for me until Kevin Spacey comes on screen. Kevin Spacey has recently become one of my favourite actors to watch, since he always does such a great job of delivering lines, and making the character’s more subtle pieces work in the movie. And this performance is no different from all his others that I love.

Another reason why I think I loved this movie so much is the villain in this movie is just so interesting. It takes me back a fortnight to when I was going crazy over The Joker in The Dark Knight. I guess I have an affinity to get drawn into these psychotic and somewhat unexplained and villains that are we are not able to understand. The only way I think you could understand this guy [without of course having a PhD in Psychology] is to let him walk you through every thought he has every moment of the day for maybe a couple of years.

This movie did touch on some social issues that are very interesting [and somewhat obvious]. The biggest one is should we really be tolerant of people who are falling to these deadly sins [even when they don’t directly affect us]? For example, one of the deadly sins is gluttony. So should we be okay with all these men [and women] who weigh so much that they become shut-ins? When you look at them you laugh and make jokes saying that they need a crane to move them from their couch to the toilet and back. Why do we believe in being quiet about these things? Just because people deserve their space, should they be able to do what they want with their own personal space without any restrictions? Even when they affect someone else, as long as it isn’t me [or anyone directly/indirectly connected to me] we just let it pass, and label them as crazy/sick/sad.

A great thing that was made clear is the similarities between the three characters [the killer, Pitt’s character, and Freeman’s character]. The killer is just a version of Pitt who does what Pitt keeps thinking should be done, Pitt is the younger and non-numbed version of Freeman’s character. Morgan Freeman’s character has worked for the police in the city for so long that he isn’t affected emotionally by these people anymore. He is numbed from it all, suppresses all of his feelings about all of the degenerates that live in the sick dark city. While Pitt’s character is coming from the cleaner and much smaller town where all these depraved people and level of crime is new to him and he can’t do much more than keep going “WTF!!!” and shouting how he wants to shoot the guy. While the killer has skipped the “WTF!!!” moment and the consideration, and just kills the people in such a dramatic way so as to gain peoples’ attention.

Overall this movie lives up to its left over hype, and is a must watch for me. I’m glad that people kept suggesting it to me, so that I finally got around to it. I worry how many more of these gems I’ve missed out on I need to see right now while I wait for something amazing to see in the theatres.

IMDB says 8.6/10

Rotten Tomatoes says 84%

I say 9.0/10