Dialogue with director Charlie Shackleton
Refocus Film Festival alum Charlie Shackleton (The Afterlight) tells the story of what might have been in this wholly original, self-aware cinematic work that cheekily indicts the true crime boom by putting it under the microscope, detailing what he would have done with his failed adaptation of a Zodiac Killer book he found on Amazon. Over vacant Bay Area landscapes, stylised re-enactments, and clips from recent true crime hits, his wry voiceover conjures the unrealised project in real time, describing beat-by-beat how he imagined it playing out. The result is an object lesson in creative frustration—and a hilarious critique of a genre at its saturation point.