I’ll try to keep it simple for you guys, as it already screwed with my brain enough. It’s a movie about an office job guy (Edward Norton) whose name isn’t even mentioned until really the end of the movie who lives a life with no excitement. He lives basically in autopilot all the time and has a sleeping problem. He starts attending these support groups, one where men go that don’t have testicles. I know, pretty weird, but the messed up part is he’s going to these horrific support group titles and doesn’t fit any of them. Somehow, he finds comfort in them until he sees Marla Singer (Helena Bonham Carter), another imposter. They make a deal splitting up time to visit the groups and he stops going for some reason and meets Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt) on a plane. The two develop a relationship that eventually turns into a co-founding of a fight club which later disastrously spirals into a cult-like organization causing havoc. I’ll stop there mainly because I don’t like the plot whatsoever and that I try not to spoil the plot on reviews.
The Pros
This movie has really solid acting. Edward Norton and more so Brad Pitt excel in delivering an interesting relationship throughout the movie. Brad Pitt has a confidence he carries with him throughout this thriller. Such as the scene where the owner and his bodyguard of the Bar where the fight club runs out of, find the weekly meeting. He maniacally talks back to the owner delivering his lines so authentically. Edward Norton plays a very good supporting role throughout and later puts on a great paranoid schizophrenic show for the viewer.
The Cons
As per usual on this blog, my problems with this movie might just be very niche and personal but I found this movie took such a horrible variant. Even after reading a little about the true meaning of Tyler Durden which I won’t spoil on here, I still am not a fan of the odd storyline this movie took after the fight club was created. I would have been satisfied with this movie just being about a fight club and about the problems an underground association/club faces, but instead there has to be this identity theme with Tyler Durden which I just don’t find entertaining. This also I feel affects the average viewer (me) in the aspect that the identity narrative takes away more than it adds to the film. This movie was doing SO well up until it took the unexpected spin it did about an hour and a half in.
Some movies feel that they have to fill what they think is the missing element of deeper meaning, and Fight Club took the deeper meaning goal way too far and confused me too much to get my praise. The Shobe Score is a 57.