Fight Club (1999)

Released: October 15, 1999
Director: David Fincher
Starring: Edward Norton, Brad Pitt, Helena Bonham Carter

Fight Club is based on the 1996 novel by Chuck Palahniuk. Fight Club had mixed reviews at the time it was released and it wasn't a big box office hit that 20th Century Fox was hoping for. But like all "cult classics" the film had later success and today you can't get through a discussion about movies with friends without somebody name dropping Fight Club, and the famous "The first rule of fight club is, you do not talk about fight club." quote that has become synonymous with pop culture.

Edward Norton plays the narrator with no name who works for an automobile company. He lives a boring incomplete life, and he has severe problems with insomnia. He tries to fake his way into a support group of testicular cancer victims to cure his insomnia but that doesn't really work out. During one of his work trips he meets an unusual man on the airplane, a soap salesman named Tyler Durden played by Brad Pitt, his life changes completely and the two become pals. After a "fun" fist fight in a parking lot outside of a bar, the two start up a fight club in a local bar's basement.

Despite getting the shit beat out of him week after week, the narrator enjoys fight club, he finds it to be a means of breaking free of his boring life, and it gives him a new outlook on life, making him feel like a somebody. The club's popularity slowly increases overtime, corporations sponsor it, the two start to franchise fight club beyond their local headquarters establishing new clubs in other states/cities. Tyler also begins to take the club in a new direction going from fights in local bars to a city wide gangs/organizations committing small acts of vandalism that go from trashing small businesses/stores to setting office buildings on fire and blowing stuff up.

Fight Club is an interesting movie of mayhem, anti-authority, destruction, and nihilism. David Fincher called his film a coming of age movie for people in their 30's. The narrator is one of those characters that most people can relate to in some way. The film is filled with various quotes that sum up the movie in a nutshell, Tyler Durden's famous "We're the middle children of history" quote especially. Because of that the film has a really gritty/dark feel with the cinematography, though the movie title is misleading the fights in the film fit the cinematography, they're bloody, grimy, and visceral.

The acting in this film is top notch. Brad Pitt and Edward Norton both put on great performances as Tyler Durden and the narrator. Norton is the stale boring office desk employee and Durden is everything Norton's character isn't but wants to be, confident, unpredictable, exciting, etc. Brad Pitt deserved an oscar nomination for his role. The movie also has great performances from Helena Bonham Carter who's Norton's love interest Marla and musician/stage actor Meat Loaf is great with his small part.

I'm starting to become a fan of David Fincher's film style. Fight Club does it all, even breaking the 4th wall at parts in the film. My only complaint with the movie was that I found the first twenty minutes to be slow at times but once the narrator meets Tyler Durden the rest of the movie is a rampage of epic proportions until the end. One of the best movies of the 90's that lives up to the hype and praise, I will view more movies by Fincher but if you're a fan then you have to see this film.

The Verdict: 4.5