Time to set the record straight.
I first saw Fight Club when it was released in cinemas and I immediately decided that I didn’t like it that much and it was overrated. I second-guessed myself maybe a year later and rented the video, still thought it wasn’t that much chop.
So here we are in 2009 (as this is written) and I saw Fight Club once again listed recently in a couple “Best Film of the last…” lists and I thought “Right, I’m older, seen a lot more stuff, surely I should give it one more chance?”
Well I did, watched it for a third time, still don’t rate it that highly. It’s an OK film but by no stretch is it an All Time anything.
And I might add here that I really like David Fincher and think he makes really interesting stuff, so I don’t think I’m tall poppy hatin’.
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Fight Club starts with a strangely inappropriate wierd techno track and equally high tech background graphics, quite odd given the at times gritty subject matter of the film.
Throughout the film we get this Oh so clever narration by Ed Norton, which largely set up the wink, wink look at me bits that are smattered throughout. Ed is also the main character, an overworked, slightly pathetic office-bunny in a shitty job with an equally shitty boss.
He is a typical everyman, working to better his situation and so he can be a consumer and somehow make his life better through his possessions, he is also a hypochondriac full of self-pity.
To feel better about himself through the suffering of others, Ed joins a cancer support group, somehow the genuine pain that he witnesses provides a degree of release, so over ensuing weeks he joins more and more support groups for various illnesses and ailments, and eventually becomes consumed with these sessions that attempt to alleviate him of symptoms he doesn’t even have. In short he becomes a group-groupie, if you will…
This all changes when an intruder dares to venture into his territory, Marla, a ratty looking woman played be Helena Bonham Carter, she is first witnessed at a cancer session (Smoking. Tee-hee.),, and soon shows up at various other groups. This ruins Ed’s focus or something, and is so distracting that he confronts her so that he might once again find peace. They eventually agree to split the sessions in a scene that screams “Oh look how we are discussing such serious illnesses like we’re divvying up lollies”.
Yawn so far.
So here comes the thing. On a work flight Ed finds himself seated alongside a unique looking guy who looks a lot like Brad Pitt, and in this case is. He introduces himself as Tyler Durden, and he is a straight-shooter who has the guts and candour to say what we in society want to say, only we don’t have the guts, (that part was written by the screenwriter, I think he talks a lot of shit). Regardless of what I might think, Ed is a little starstruck and impressed by the imposing figure.
On arriving home Ed finds his apartment razed to the ground by fire, and he also loses his luggage. Aside from what he is wearing he is left with nothing, running out of options he initially calls Marla, then on a rethink decides to call Tyler.
Of course Tyler is frivolous, quirky and rebellious, and he lives in a run down fixer-upper. The two start spending a lot of time together, Ed obviously admires all the ways that Tyler differs from him, and Tyler obviously admires all the ways that he is the same as himself.
After a drinking session they decide to beat the crap out of each other, for some reason this seems a good idea even after the event, and others are introduced to what they term Fight Club, strange given the fact that everyone knows the #1 and #2 rules of Fight Club are that “No-one talks about Fight Club!” Not a strong marketing approach right there.
(By the way, Fight Clubs exist, they are called Boxing clubs. Anyone who argues that “Fight Clubs would be cool” should join one or shut the fuck up.)
Anyway despite supposed anti mass media blitz Fight Club becomes a hit, and they start springing up all over the shop, Ed and Tyler become consumed by the sessions.
Out of the blue Marla calls the new house and shows up. After being given the shoulder by Ed she bones Tyler. A lot.
After a couple more antics Tyler gets a rep in underground circles and over time becomes mythologisatelated. After his street cred is set, Tyler begins handing out seemingly minor homework assignments to members, petty stuff that is mostly creating a nuisance and anti-societal stuff.
Only as time elapses the nature of these tasks evolves and expands and more and more devotees / followers / recruits show up to become indoctrinated by the cult of Tyler.
I won’t go into the so-called mega-twist even though the movie is 10 years old and you probably know by now. Suffice to say that even if I was to swallow the twist (which I don’t) and believe the fact that two guys, no matter how charismatic, can convince a bunch of other guys to allow themselves to get the crap kicked out of them and furthermore, then agree to perform many illegal tasks and put themselves at great risk, I still don’t think the film is that good.
The acting is fine, there are some good scenes and yes indeed some clever bits, but I count myself as one of those guys who just don’t get it. So I think it is nothing more than an OK film.
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My view of why so many people vehemently stick up for Fight Club and argue its merits:
Most are smart (but not as smart as they think they are), and think that the techno babble, inane cult-speak and various anti-establishment acts are “cool”.
What puts Fight l over the top for these guys though is the fact that these very same clever(ish), guys are also hard nuts who fight for no reason and don’t care what the mainstream think!
Oh if that ain’t what a bunch of wannabees would love to put on their Facebook “About me” section I don’t know what is.
Only in real life guys, no-one speaks like this and if they do they are dickheads. Anyone who goes looking for a fight for no reason? Not Brad Pitt enigmatic rebel-type guys: dickheads. Anyone who completes petty crimes and does things to upset mainstream society? Dickheads.
Anyone who thinks that Fight Club is so much more than a movie and says “Yeah I’d join one in a second!”
Dickhead.
Final Rating – 7 / 10. This is no more than an OK movie. Now that I am positive of this I will never watch it again. One of the more overrated films in the last 20 years. Enough fanboys.
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SPOILER ALERT!!
SPOILER ALERT!!
SPOILER ALERT!!
SPOILER ALERT!!
SPOILER ALERT!!
One last chance…
SPOILER ALERT!!
Enough chances to stop. Ed Norton is Tyler Durden, Brad Pitt is Tyler Durden, only he doesn’t exist. He is a figment of Ed’s imagination. All scenes involving Brad Pitt are actually Ed either imagining things or sitting outside himself and looking on.
My problem with this? Ed only realises that Pitt’s Tyler doesn’t exist when Marla calls him Tyler. Rewatching the film shows that to that point no-one referred to him by name, and after the dam breaks though it seems hardly a sentence goes by without someone calling him Tyler, as if to clumsily reinforce this so-called bombshell.
Does this mean that Ed’s character had no name to that point?
That no-one actually called him by his name, or he forgot it?
Or that he was named Tyler Durden all along and just didn’t think it odd that the new guy shared his name?
WHAT THE FUCK IS UP WITH THAT??????
