Watch: David Fincher, From His Commercials Up to ‘Se7en’: A Video Essay

This piece, the second part of a prolonged series on David Fincher, takes us inside the work leading up to ‘Se7en.’ Fincher made, prior to this remarkable film, a number of inspired and influential commercials for Nike, Coca-Cola, and other companies. And it could be said that he brought his gift for rattling around inside a form to ‘Se7en’: just as he did with the constraint of creating an advertisement, he took what could have been a fairly routine police procedural and transformed it into a horror-show on more levels than just the "what’s in the box" level–professional integrity, marital stability, and the nature of masculinity are all questioned and examined inside a film that unfolds like the best yarn you’ve ever heard. The Raccord collective is making a significant contribution to film scholarship with their directors series, and it behooves any earnest film fan to take heed.