Fight Club

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To say this year has been a good year for the American Cinema is like saying that Mother Theresa was a nice woman. It's an understatement. As a film fanatic I have watched many films this year, from The Matrix to Star Wars to The Iron Giant to American Beauty. And every time I have been amazed by what I have seen. But nothing has amazed me quite as much as FIGHT CLUB.

FIGHT CLUB is director David Fincher's biggest risk, a film that is filled with as many immoral characters as it is with intriguing ideas and theories. Fincher has trotted down the road of moral ambiguity with SEVEN and with his latest opus he does it again. The film is based upon Chuck Palahniuck's 1997 novel of the same name. I have yet to read it (waiting for the bookstore to ship me my copy) but the author describes it as a what-if scenario. He isn't suggesting that we go out to do any of the stuff the characters do in the story but instead wants to present us with a view of the world according to someone caught in its deathlike grip.

The People of Fight Club

There are two main characters in FIGHT CLUB: The Narrator (Ed Norton) and Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt). The Narrator is a nameless man in the story (so let's call him Jack). He is a gen-xer that has grown to the point of despair. He can not sleep. He has to have every little clever trinket that he sees. The only way he finds happiness is crashing support groups for those with terminal diseases. He says it is amazing how much people care when they think you are dying.

Durden on the other hand is a man with little scruples. He is not an evil man. He just wants to wake people up from the perpetual dream world that they live in and he will go to any lengths to achieve his vision of setting people free. He lives in an old house that was most likely condemned a century ago. It sits in front of an old factory. His nearest neighbor is a mile and half away. Tyler makes and sells soap. He also has other jobs that afford him time to do not so pleasant things such as urinate in soup at high class restaurants and splice objectionable images into family films in major theater chains.

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