It's fine. It's very fine. Edward Norton and Brad Pitt do what they need to, with charismatic and despicable performances that are the same and different in all the right ways. There's some inspired cinematography and an electric energy to Fincher's directing; the man did not phone it in by any means. It's just not quite as smart as it wants to be.
Fight Club falls prey to the biggest pitfall any satire or cautionary tale must avoid: glamorizing what it wants to condemn. Of course the point of the film is to criticize Durden's toxic masculinity and cynicism, but those aspects get far more attention than the narrator's path to redemption. Perhaps if more time was paid to his relationship with Marla, if we really saw how they connected and the benefits of him letting his walls down and being vulnerable, or if we got more showing us and less telling us that giving in to these urges did not make the narrator truly happy but left him hollow, its themes would hit harder.
But the titular fight club and all the vices related to it, the cynicism and bitterness that breeds it, get far more attention than what it takes to get out of it. In a sense I can't blame the audience members who took the wrong message- it is a failing of the film. I'm reminded of American Psycho, which in my opinion did a far better job conveying the pathetic and empty insipidness and emptiness of the protagonist and the time and system that birthed him.
I can't say this is a bad film, but I can't say it's a great one, either. It gains some great momentum as it propels towards the end- for some reason I was under the impression before watching that the famous twist was more of an unconfirmed theory a la the one for Ferris Bueller- but it's set up very well and adds a level of intrigue to the film, making many scenes more fascinating by the reveal, and I respect the film more for committing to it. But on a whole, the film revels too much in its subject to be an effective warning for those it wants to reach, and for those already on its message's side edgy lines like "We used to read pornography- now it's the Horchow Collection" or constant mention of 'man tits' may get more chuckles, eye rolls, or sighs out of you than deep thought. I'm not sure who this movie is for, but I am sure it's not me. In the end, Fight Club is not a movie that'll stick with me. I'll have no trouble obeying its first rule.
Review by JCVIP 4BlockedParent2021-05-26T06:20:16Z
It's fine. It's very fine. Edward Norton and Brad Pitt do what they need to, with charismatic and despicable performances that are the same and different in all the right ways. There's some inspired cinematography and an electric energy to Fincher's directing; the man did not phone it in by any means. It's just not quite as smart as it wants to be.
Fight Club falls prey to the biggest pitfall any satire or cautionary tale must avoid: glamorizing what it wants to condemn. Of course the point of the film is to criticize Durden's toxic masculinity and cynicism, but those aspects get far more attention than the narrator's path to redemption. Perhaps if more time was paid to his relationship with Marla, if we really saw how they connected and the benefits of him letting his walls down and being vulnerable, or if we got more showing us and less telling us that giving in to these urges did not make the narrator truly happy but left him hollow, its themes would hit harder.
But the titular fight club and all the vices related to it, the cynicism and bitterness that breeds it, get far more attention than what it takes to get out of it. In a sense I can't blame the audience members who took the wrong message- it is a failing of the film. I'm reminded of American Psycho, which in my opinion did a far better job conveying the pathetic and empty insipidness and emptiness of the protagonist and the time and system that birthed him.
I can't say this is a bad film, but I can't say it's a great one, either. It gains some great momentum as it propels towards the end- for some reason I was under the impression before watching that the famous twist was more of an unconfirmed theory a la the one for Ferris Bueller- but it's set up very well and adds a level of intrigue to the film, making many scenes more fascinating by the reveal, and I respect the film more for committing to it. But on a whole, the film revels too much in its subject to be an effective warning for those it wants to reach, and for those already on its message's side edgy lines like "We used to read pornography- now it's the Horchow Collection" or constant mention of 'man tits' may get more chuckles, eye rolls, or sighs out of you than deep thought. I'm not sure who this movie is for, but I am sure it's not me. In the end, Fight Club is not a movie that'll stick with me. I'll have no trouble obeying its first rule.