What I think about Fight Club
Based on the novel Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk
Starring Edward Norton as The Narrator, Brad Pitt as Tyler Durden, and Helena Bonham Carter as Marla Singer
Released in 1999
This, like Whiplash, is one of my favourite films ever. Unlike Whiplash, it stars three of my favourite actors, and is directed by easily my favourite director. Given that, you are about to read an overwhelmingly positive piece. Or at least an overwhelming piece. Turns out that what I think about Fight Club is... a lot.
Fight Club focuses on an unnamed narrator (henceforth simply The Narrator), an insomniac who works a soul-crushing job for which he has to travel a lot. He fills his life with meaningless television, IKEA furniture, and other insignificant material possessions. On recommendation, he visits a testicular cancer survivors group, posing as a survivor himself, and finds himself crying during a scheduled hugging moment. He begins going to several support groups, finding himself cured of his insomnia, but this is ruined by someone else going to all his groups, clearly a poser herself: Marla. He confronts her and they agree to split the days so they never have to see each other again, but exchange numbers anyway. Returning from one of his business trips, The Narrator encounters a bizarre man named Tyler Durden. Upon arriving home, he finds his apartment has exploded, and he calls Tyler for a drink. Tyler offers him a place to stay, on the condition that The Narrator hits him as hard as he can. Tyler responds in earnest, and the two brawl outside the bar. Their friendship grows, and they continue to regularly fight outside the same bar. People begin getting more interested, and soon they have a group of men who have joined "Fight Club". During this time, Tyler starts regularly sleeping with Marla. As Tyler and The Narrator grow further apart, Tyler morphs Fight Club into Project Mayhem, a guerrilla terrorist group against materialism, consumerism, and modern obsession with superficiality. Tyler reveals to The Narrator that they are the same person. Tyler's operation culminates in a plan to erase debt by bombing the buildings of credit card companies, and therefore all the debt records, in order to 'reset' society. The Narrator tries to stop this, but is hindered by many secret members of Fight Club/Project Mayhem. He manages to send Marla outside of the city and disarm the bombs rigged to blow up one building, but she is brought back as The Narrator "kills" Tyler by shooting himself through the back of his mouth, not quite killing himself. The two watch as the city's skyscrapers explode and collapse.
Fight Club focuses on an unnamed narrator (henceforth simply The Narrator), an insomniac who works a soul-crushing job for which he has to travel a lot. He fills his life with meaningless television, IKEA furniture, and other insignificant material possessions. On recommendation, he visits a testicular cancer survivors group, posing as a survivor himself, and finds himself crying during a scheduled hugging moment. He begins going to several support groups, finding himself cured of his insomnia, but this is ruined by someone else going to all his groups, clearly a poser herself: Marla. He confronts her and they agree to split the days so they never have to see each other again, but exchange numbers anyway. Returning from one of his business trips, The Narrator encounters a bizarre man named Tyler Durden. Upon arriving home, he finds his apartment has exploded, and he calls Tyler for a drink. Tyler offers him a place to stay, on the condition that The Narrator hits him as hard as he can. Tyler responds in earnest, and the two brawl outside the bar. Their friendship grows, and they continue to regularly fight outside the same bar. People begin getting more interested, and soon they have a group of men who have joined "Fight Club". During this time, Tyler starts regularly sleeping with Marla. As Tyler and The Narrator grow further apart, Tyler morphs Fight Club into Project Mayhem, a guerrilla terrorist group against materialism, consumerism, and modern obsession with superficiality. Tyler reveals to The Narrator that they are the same person. Tyler's operation culminates in a plan to erase debt by bombing the buildings of credit card companies, and therefore all the debt records, in order to 'reset' society. The Narrator tries to stop this, but is hindered by many secret members of Fight Club/Project Mayhem. He manages to send Marla outside of the city and disarm the bombs rigged to blow up one building, but she is brought back as The Narrator "kills" Tyler by shooting himself through the back of his mouth, not quite killing himself. The two watch as the city's skyscrapers explode and collapse.
Jeez. Apologies for how long-winded that was.
Ed Norton does a decent job playing the deadpan Narrator, pulling off a convincing performance that emotions are very hard for him to deal with. Helena Bonham Carter does a decent job playing a weirdo (shocker) (I actually have more to say about Marla's function in the story, I'm just being snarky). The real star of Fight Club is Brad Pitt.
Pitt as Tyler Durden is utterly electrifying. It's this film, among others in the 90s, which cemented in my mind that Brad Pitt is far more than a Hollywood pretty-boy; he is a highly talented actor who cares an awful lot about his craft.
Not that Pitt being a pretty-boy doesn't help; much of Durden's appeal lies in his physical attractiveness, and Pitt's charm is vital in sucking disillusioned youth into his cause. It's also an immediately identifiable way of demonstrating the differences between Tyler and relatively plain-looking Narrator, summed up well by Tyler in the scene when he reveals what he actually is.
Tyler: All the ways you wish you could be, that's me. I look like you wanna look, I fuck like you wanna fuck, I am smart, capable, and most importantly, I am free in all the ways that you are not.
I hope that doesn't hold true for Pitt and Norton's real-life relationship.
Anyway. An interesting narrative device is the repeated "I am Jack's..." from The Narrator. In the basement of Tyler's home, he finds a series of articles written from the perspective of various organs, such as "I am Jack's medulla oblongata". From that point on, The Narrator uses this phrase to convey what he is feeling, usually in VO but once, to his boss, out loud (much to his boss' confusion).
The Narrator: I am Jack's cold sweat.
The Narrator: I am Jack's raging bile duct.
The Narrator: I am Jack's broken heart.
The Narrator: I am Jack's wasted life.
The Narrator: I am Jack's inflamed sense of rejection.
The Narrator: I am Jack's complete lack of surprise.
The Narrator: I am Jack's smirking revenge.
The fourth wall breaking, normally seen as a wink wink joke for the audience (and, in fairness, it is), I think serves to establish a rapport between The Narrator and Tyler and the audience. This is done through comedy, through 'easter eggs' the audience feels good for catching (Tyler appearing for single frames before he is introduced, for example), and through VO; acknowledgement that a story is being told. And then there's a scene, much later in the film, where Tyler rants/preaches directly at the camera. The film comes loose and we see the sprockets running down the sides of the screen as the shot shakes and the music becomes more distorted. Tyler is actually trying to persuade the audience of his way of thinking. He has a similar speech later, shortly before he disappears, but we see it from The Narrator's perspective; Tyler's voice is soft and far away, and he's looking away from the camera, signalling the two's imminent breakdown.
My personal favourite part about Fight Club - and probably the reason it's my favourite film and indeed my favourite Fincher film - is the delicious irony of how it's viewed in popular culture. Frat boys, edgy teenagers (not guilty), and wannabe anarchists idolise Durden, they have posters of his quotes on their walls, they'll talk about how consumerism is killing the world while buying the special edition steel-case blu-ray, the officially licensed video game, licensed t-shirts, Fight Club brand soap, and so on. Delectable.
The Narrator: It was beautiful. We were selling rich women their own fat asses back to them.
Marla Singer is the only major female character in Fight Club. At first glance, she appears as merely an object of affection for Tyler and The Narrator, and seeing as how the film explores its themes primarily through the relationship of Tyler and The Narrator, that isn't too far off. But it's reductive. Marla mirrors The Narrator in several ways; she is alone, at a dead end in life, and most importantly disconnected from modern femininity. She is also linked to The Narrator's destruction, though through no fault of her own; his apartment is shown blowing up and is intercut with her speaking; she is what The Narrator hallucinates when he receives Tyler's kiss; she is present, finally, when the city's financial buildings explode.
Marla's traditional femininity is realised when she is saved by then sleeps with the traditional masculine ideal: Tyler (this, by the way, being the catalyst of the wedge driven between Tyler and The Narrator, is another example of her being linked to his destruction). Their sex is not love-based; it's harsh and perverse. Take from that what you will. Point is, this (briefly and intermittently) realised, she still retains herself. She does not change. Her conversation with The Narrator about the second-hand bridesmaid's dress is pure Marla. This, as I'll discuss, is in utter opposition to The Narrator realising his own masculine ideal.
Marla: The condom is the glass slipper of our generation. You slip it on when you meet a stranger... you dance all night... then you throw it away. The condom, I mean, not the stranger.
The Narrator: ...what?
A major theme of the film is masculinity (in fact, this is a theme, major or otherwise, in most of Fincher's films that I can think of), and the role of the traditional male in a modern society. The Narrator is the archetypal modern man who has lost touch with his traditional masculinity. Both Tyler and The Narrator discuss how their fathers ran out on them, and they were raised by their mothers; one can find, then, that The Narrator creates Tyler as a replacement for the role model he never had. Together, they reject the modernity and consumerism which The Narrator is so overwhelmed by in the film's opening; they live in squalor, they wear filthy clothes, they groom themselves only out of necessity; they see themselves, through their new lifestyle (made manifest in Fight Club), as more powerful than ordinary people, finding themselves sizing up every situation.
However The Narrator, when he does encounter difficulties (initially his feelings for Marla, but later his rejection by Tyler in favour of Angel Face), finds no help in Tyler, who turns him away in favour of managing Fight Club and Project Mayhem - though Tyler has ideological and theoretical solutions to large-scale problems, he has little to no concern for the petty struggles of everyday life. This is lightly foreshadowed by the contrast in their respective physical appearances; through Fight Club, The Narrator develops serious cuts, bruises, loses teeth; while Tyler becomes more toned and muscular. It is roughly around the two becoming more distant that The Narrator's life begins to go downhill again. Literally, this is because The Narrator is getting less and less sleep as Tyler becomes more and more active. Thematically, The Narrator is seeing the issues with taking his masculine ideal to its extreme (most prominently the abandonment of personal connections in the pursuit of ideology, as seen in Tyler going from instructing people personally in Fight Club to commanding them with a megaphone, as seen in Marla becoming more distant from The Narrator, as seen in the death of Bob), though he does not yet know he has created Tyler.
After Tyler disappears and The Narrator goes looking for him, then finds out the truth about who and what Tyler is, The Narrator first gets Marla out of the city, then tries to stop the plans of Project Mayhem. He does the latter first as himself, then by trying (and failing) to impersonate Tyler, but finds Tyler has set out contingencies for that. It's a critical thematic moment: impersonating his masculine ideal results in failure. Instead, he achieves a small victory by wholeheartedly rejecting it; escaping the police station and disarming one of the buildings' bombs. It is not until he stops weakly impersonating or running from his traditional masculinity that he finally succeeds; not until he realises that he is his masculine ideal, or more accurately that he can be his masculine ideal, that he becomes free. First, he is reminded of Marla - a representation of his more feminine (or, if you like, emasculated, though that somewhat defeats the point) side - when he sees her being carried into the building from the window, then stops paying attention to Tyler and has his realisation. It's done flawlessly.
The scene: Tyler sits across from The Narrator on a large box to give him a good view of the impending destruction. The Narrator, slumped in an office chair, has his back turned to the window. He is not looking at Tyler; his head is in his hands. Tyler is smoking a cigarette and lazily holding a handgun.
The Narrator: I can figure this out. I can figure this out, this isn't even real. You're not real, the gun is... The gun isn't even in your hand. The gun is in my hand.
The camera pans down. He is indeed holding the gun. Fascinatingly, Tyler tries to appeal to The Narrator when he realises he is in danger.
Tyler: Hey. It's you and me. Friends?
It doesn't work. Like The Narrator's own paltry imitation of Tyler, Tyler finds himself unable to conjure up any belief that he actually cares about his relationship with The Narrator. The Narrator then shoots himself and kills Tyler, severely injuring himself. He is free from Tyler through his own sacrifice, and finally becomes interlinked with his femininity when he and Marla hold hands and watch the city explode.
Fight Club is a movie which requires at least two watches. One totally blind, and one knowing that The Narrator and Tyler Durden are the same person. It has an odd quality about it, something surreal and 'off'. Fincher's cinematography is mostly the cause of this; he favours tripod shots over handheld, and uses that together with special effects to make it seem as though the camera is omniscient, travelling through walls, being impossibly precise and what have you. The film truly exists as 'something else'. Fincher called it a coming-of-age film for 30 year olds. Jim Uhls, the screenwriter, called it a rom-com. People have read it as a noir, a thriller, a black comedy.
Whatever it is, I love it. It's a 9/10 from me.
Pitt as Tyler Durden is utterly electrifying. It's this film, among others in the 90s, which cemented in my mind that Brad Pitt is far more than a Hollywood pretty-boy; he is a highly talented actor who cares an awful lot about his craft.
Not that Pitt being a pretty-boy doesn't help; much of Durden's appeal lies in his physical attractiveness, and Pitt's charm is vital in sucking disillusioned youth into his cause. It's also an immediately identifiable way of demonstrating the differences between Tyler and relatively plain-looking Narrator, summed up well by Tyler in the scene when he reveals what he actually is.
Tyler: All the ways you wish you could be, that's me. I look like you wanna look, I fuck like you wanna fuck, I am smart, capable, and most importantly, I am free in all the ways that you are not.
I hope that doesn't hold true for Pitt and Norton's real-life relationship.
Anyway. An interesting narrative device is the repeated "I am Jack's..." from The Narrator. In the basement of Tyler's home, he finds a series of articles written from the perspective of various organs, such as "I am Jack's medulla oblongata". From that point on, The Narrator uses this phrase to convey what he is feeling, usually in VO but once, to his boss, out loud (much to his boss' confusion).
The Narrator: I am Jack's cold sweat.
The Narrator: I am Jack's raging bile duct.
The Narrator: I am Jack's broken heart.
The Narrator: I am Jack's wasted life.
The Narrator: I am Jack's inflamed sense of rejection.
The Narrator: I am Jack's complete lack of surprise.
The Narrator: I am Jack's smirking revenge.
The fourth wall breaking, normally seen as a wink wink joke for the audience (and, in fairness, it is), I think serves to establish a rapport between The Narrator and Tyler and the audience. This is done through comedy, through 'easter eggs' the audience feels good for catching (Tyler appearing for single frames before he is introduced, for example), and through VO; acknowledgement that a story is being told. And then there's a scene, much later in the film, where Tyler rants/preaches directly at the camera. The film comes loose and we see the sprockets running down the sides of the screen as the shot shakes and the music becomes more distorted. Tyler is actually trying to persuade the audience of his way of thinking. He has a similar speech later, shortly before he disappears, but we see it from The Narrator's perspective; Tyler's voice is soft and far away, and he's looking away from the camera, signalling the two's imminent breakdown.
My personal favourite part about Fight Club - and probably the reason it's my favourite film and indeed my favourite Fincher film - is the delicious irony of how it's viewed in popular culture. Frat boys, edgy teenagers (not guilty), and wannabe anarchists idolise Durden, they have posters of his quotes on their walls, they'll talk about how consumerism is killing the world while buying the special edition steel-case blu-ray, the officially licensed video game, licensed t-shirts, Fight Club brand soap, and so on. Delectable.
The Narrator: It was beautiful. We were selling rich women their own fat asses back to them.
Marla Singer is the only major female character in Fight Club. At first glance, she appears as merely an object of affection for Tyler and The Narrator, and seeing as how the film explores its themes primarily through the relationship of Tyler and The Narrator, that isn't too far off. But it's reductive. Marla mirrors The Narrator in several ways; she is alone, at a dead end in life, and most importantly disconnected from modern femininity. She is also linked to The Narrator's destruction, though through no fault of her own; his apartment is shown blowing up and is intercut with her speaking; she is what The Narrator hallucinates when he receives Tyler's kiss; she is present, finally, when the city's financial buildings explode.
Marla's traditional femininity is realised when she is saved by then sleeps with the traditional masculine ideal: Tyler (this, by the way, being the catalyst of the wedge driven between Tyler and The Narrator, is another example of her being linked to his destruction). Their sex is not love-based; it's harsh and perverse. Take from that what you will. Point is, this (briefly and intermittently) realised, she still retains herself. She does not change. Her conversation with The Narrator about the second-hand bridesmaid's dress is pure Marla. This, as I'll discuss, is in utter opposition to The Narrator realising his own masculine ideal.
Marla: The condom is the glass slipper of our generation. You slip it on when you meet a stranger... you dance all night... then you throw it away. The condom, I mean, not the stranger.
The Narrator: ...what?
A major theme of the film is masculinity (in fact, this is a theme, major or otherwise, in most of Fincher's films that I can think of), and the role of the traditional male in a modern society. The Narrator is the archetypal modern man who has lost touch with his traditional masculinity. Both Tyler and The Narrator discuss how their fathers ran out on them, and they were raised by their mothers; one can find, then, that The Narrator creates Tyler as a replacement for the role model he never had. Together, they reject the modernity and consumerism which The Narrator is so overwhelmed by in the film's opening; they live in squalor, they wear filthy clothes, they groom themselves only out of necessity; they see themselves, through their new lifestyle (made manifest in Fight Club), as more powerful than ordinary people, finding themselves sizing up every situation.
However The Narrator, when he does encounter difficulties (initially his feelings for Marla, but later his rejection by Tyler in favour of Angel Face), finds no help in Tyler, who turns him away in favour of managing Fight Club and Project Mayhem - though Tyler has ideological and theoretical solutions to large-scale problems, he has little to no concern for the petty struggles of everyday life. This is lightly foreshadowed by the contrast in their respective physical appearances; through Fight Club, The Narrator develops serious cuts, bruises, loses teeth; while Tyler becomes more toned and muscular. It is roughly around the two becoming more distant that The Narrator's life begins to go downhill again. Literally, this is because The Narrator is getting less and less sleep as Tyler becomes more and more active. Thematically, The Narrator is seeing the issues with taking his masculine ideal to its extreme (most prominently the abandonment of personal connections in the pursuit of ideology, as seen in Tyler going from instructing people personally in Fight Club to commanding them with a megaphone, as seen in Marla becoming more distant from The Narrator, as seen in the death of Bob), though he does not yet know he has created Tyler.
After Tyler disappears and The Narrator goes looking for him, then finds out the truth about who and what Tyler is, The Narrator first gets Marla out of the city, then tries to stop the plans of Project Mayhem. He does the latter first as himself, then by trying (and failing) to impersonate Tyler, but finds Tyler has set out contingencies for that. It's a critical thematic moment: impersonating his masculine ideal results in failure. Instead, he achieves a small victory by wholeheartedly rejecting it; escaping the police station and disarming one of the buildings' bombs. It is not until he stops weakly impersonating or running from his traditional masculinity that he finally succeeds; not until he realises that he is his masculine ideal, or more accurately that he can be his masculine ideal, that he becomes free. First, he is reminded of Marla - a representation of his more feminine (or, if you like, emasculated, though that somewhat defeats the point) side - when he sees her being carried into the building from the window, then stops paying attention to Tyler and has his realisation. It's done flawlessly.
The scene: Tyler sits across from The Narrator on a large box to give him a good view of the impending destruction. The Narrator, slumped in an office chair, has his back turned to the window. He is not looking at Tyler; his head is in his hands. Tyler is smoking a cigarette and lazily holding a handgun.
The Narrator: I can figure this out. I can figure this out, this isn't even real. You're not real, the gun is... The gun isn't even in your hand. The gun is in my hand.
The camera pans down. He is indeed holding the gun. Fascinatingly, Tyler tries to appeal to The Narrator when he realises he is in danger.
Tyler: Hey. It's you and me. Friends?
It doesn't work. Like The Narrator's own paltry imitation of Tyler, Tyler finds himself unable to conjure up any belief that he actually cares about his relationship with The Narrator. The Narrator then shoots himself and kills Tyler, severely injuring himself. He is free from Tyler through his own sacrifice, and finally becomes interlinked with his femininity when he and Marla hold hands and watch the city explode.
Fight Club is a movie which requires at least two watches. One totally blind, and one knowing that The Narrator and Tyler Durden are the same person. It has an odd quality about it, something surreal and 'off'. Fincher's cinematography is mostly the cause of this; he favours tripod shots over handheld, and uses that together with special effects to make it seem as though the camera is omniscient, travelling through walls, being impossibly precise and what have you. The film truly exists as 'something else'. Fincher called it a coming-of-age film for 30 year olds. Jim Uhls, the screenwriter, called it a rom-com. People have read it as a noir, a thriller, a black comedy.
Whatever it is, I love it. It's a 9/10 from me.
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