Cast
Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt)
Narrator (Edward Norton)
Marla Singer (Helena Bonham Carter)
Robert Paulson (Meat Loaf Aday)
Angel Face (Jared Leto)

Directed by David Fincher Written by Jim Uhls
Rated R for disturbing and graphic depiction of violent anti-social behavior, sexuality, and language
Running Time: 135 minutes Distributed by 20th Century Fox

Buy this Poster!

Fight Club is a brutal, chaotic, and dark satire. The story is introduced with a nameless narrator (Norton), who is an insomniac but also a hardworking man. He sees his life as an endless pithole that just keeps getting deeper and darker. However, things change when he encounters a new friend by the name of Tyler Durden (Pitt). Tyler is a rough and cocky soap salesman. Together, the new friends develop "fight club", which is a no holds barred, bare knuckle, and underground secret group of men who beat the hell out of each other for adrenaline. As "fight club" begins to grow from city to city, Tyler begins to become more powerful and evil. Through the narrator's eyes we see an empire of terrorists grow from "fight club", and the narrator himself might be the only person that can abolish it.

Fight Club is a different character driven film that is at sometimes humorous. The film opens strong and then twists very unexpectedly, but I felt that the ending of the film is very dismal.

David Fincher directed Fight Club. Fincher's previous credits include Alien 3, Seven, and The Game. His jumpy and quick camera work is terrific and very unique. Like Fincher's previous films Alien 3 and Seven, Fight Club is very bloody and full of graphic violence. His direction is the most brutal violence I have seen since Oliver Stone's Natural Born Killers. It is Fincher's style; he loves to expose bruises, blood, and gore. His strength is his quick cuts through out Fight Club. As Fight Club molds into a story, Fincher paces the audience quickly through the development and medium of the "fight clubs".

Jim Uhls wrote Fight Club. Uhls opens the script very effectively with the nice character development. However, the most amazing piece of the writing is how Uhls takes the audience through a 360-degree rollercoaster when the unbelievable secret of Fight Club is revealed. The one aspect that really hurt this film was the last scene. The scene just seemed incomplete and confusing. Everything is built up so nicely towards a huge climatic sequence, and then the scene ends up dry and bland. Nevertheless, the script is very smart and original.

The acting in Fight Club is strong and firm. Brad Pitt is a boiling upheaval as Tyler Durden. Pitt continues to show his versatility and talent as one the best actors around in Fight Club. Edward Norton is striking and appreciable as the nameless narrator. Norton reflects a character full of stress and depression, which is probably one of the hardest moods to portray in acting terms. Norton is also a dominant actor in Hollywood, he should have won an Oscar last year for performance in American History X. His role in Fight Club is incredible, however I believe that his performance will be overlooked by the Academy. It doesn't matter, Norton seems to be a smart actor, and he will probably end up with a few Oscars before his career is over. In addition to, Helena Bonham Carter and Meatloaf Aday are outstanding in supporting roles. Carter plays Marla, who is the entangle woman between Tyler and the narrator, and Aday plays Bob, a different type of member of Fight Club than you would expect. The performances in this film are excellent and complete.

Fight Club is a film unparalleled to any other film. It is a very dark and very violent movie, so what I am saying is that no one under 17 should see this movie. Fight Club is a terrific movie. The film's only downfall in my opinion was its unexplained and mellow ending.

Report Card Grade: B+

Beastman's Movie Reviews