David Fincher's Fight Club
Action and drama are the basic features any movie requires to reach success but David Fincher gives these two genres a whole new meaning in his movie ‘Fight Club’. The film, featuring big time stars like Brad Pitt, Edward Norton, Helena Bonham Carter, Meat Loaf, and Jared Leto, was released in 1999 and is based on a novel written by Chuck Palahniuk of the same name. The movie tells the story of how an ordinary man, the “narrator”, suffering from insomnia seeking happiness in support groups ends up in a fight club.
The narrator, looking for an escape from his uber-busy life, turns to a testicular cancer support group without having the disease to experience satisfaction. However, his happiness is short-lived when he finds another imposter there
named Marla Singer. After a negotiation to avoid common support groups does not go well with Marla, the narrator seeks friendship and support in Tyler Durden, a salesman he met on a flight. To cope with anger management and other issues, the two form a fight club, eventually several in the country, with the instruction to the narrator never to talk about Tyler. Some more interesting events occur, leading to the organization of ‘Project Mayhem’, and a shocking reveal about Tyler Durden and the movie ends with Marla and the narrator holding hands.
Revolving around the tale of a depressed man, ‘Fight Club’ is a dark dramedy with a major suspense element which manages to grip the viewers for the entire show. A cast full of excellent actors with the Edward Norton’s highly convincing role of a psychologically disturbed “narrator”, the movie brilliantly captures the ‘crisis of masculinity’ in these dysfunctional fighters, something that cannot be tarnished by all that gore and violence. With its remarkably real yet fictional characters, a lot of well-timed action sequences, and the added humour element, the movie is both "funny and seditious" as Fincher intended and is overall a masterpiece.
The narrator, looking for an escape from his uber-busy life, turns to a testicular cancer support group without having the disease to experience satisfaction. However, his happiness is short-lived when he finds another imposter there
named Marla Singer. After a negotiation to avoid common support groups does not go well with Marla, the narrator seeks friendship and support in Tyler Durden, a salesman he met on a flight. To cope with anger management and other issues, the two form a fight club, eventually several in the country, with the instruction to the narrator never to talk about Tyler. Some more interesting events occur, leading to the organization of ‘Project Mayhem’, and a shocking reveal about Tyler Durden and the movie ends with Marla and the narrator holding hands.
Revolving around the tale of a depressed man, ‘Fight Club’ is a dark dramedy with a major suspense element which manages to grip the viewers for the entire show. A cast full of excellent actors with the Edward Norton’s highly convincing role of a psychologically disturbed “narrator”, the movie brilliantly captures the ‘crisis of masculinity’ in these dysfunctional fighters, something that cannot be tarnished by all that gore and violence. With its remarkably real yet fictional characters, a lot of well-timed action sequences, and the added humour element, the movie is both "funny and seditious" as Fincher intended and is overall a masterpiece.