FIGHT CLUB review v2.0 - Heavy Spoilers

Saw FIGHT CLUB a second time tonight, and upon second viewing found myself in a conundrum of wanting to talk more about the film and some of what I’m seeing coming out around the web and the world about it.

I have been hearing the term ‘porn’ and ‘pornographic’ used in relation to this film and this really disturbs me. It’s the same feeling I get when those same terms are leveled upon one of Russ Meyer and Roger Ebert’s works.... BEYOND THE VALLEY OF THE DOLLS.

Sure in that film there was nudity and violence, there was... quite a bit of it really, but the difference between that film and anything I would begin to deem as pornographic is the fierce intelligence and wit and humor that is found throughout that film that more than made up for the depravity seen through it.

It seems to me that from time to time we have a film that really lays bare a generational shift, a film that clearly shows us where the fault line between the age masses lie.

It seems to me that FIGHT CLUB is going to be one of those films. Now, I am not going to lay this whole thing upon the statement, ‘Them old farts don’t know what they are talking about,’ because my father (geek) loves the film and I've been calling him an old fart for years.

So... What is it? Well, I believe that a very large portion of this falls upon the outright fear that the film is too cool for it’s own good. They fear that because Brad Pitt is soooooo charismatic as Tyler Durden, that a legion of film-going space monkeys will descend upon the earth to beat and vandalize society. The pure media saturation of every teen crime and the amount of ink and pixels taken up discussing the smallest minutiae of Columbine has created this very real fear of what youth gone unchecked can accomplish. As a result a whole bunch of normally reasonable folks are getting up in arms about this movie. The fear is not about guys getting in brawls. There is more to it than that.

However, for me. I do not see the violence in this film as being ‘cool’ or without ramifications. This isn’t BLOODSPORT or STREETFIGHTER.

(AT THIS POINT, THOSE OF YOU WHO HAVE NOT SEEN THE FILM, PLEASE LEAVE THIS PAGE. TO ADDRESS WHAT I NEED TO HERE, I WILL BE DISCUSSING SPOILERS THAT YOU.... YOU DO NOT WANT TO KNOW GOING INTO THIS FILM. DO NOT READ THE TALK BACKS ON THIS PAGE, UNTIL AFTER YOU’VE SEEN THE MOVIE. I CAN NOT STRONGLY SUGGEST ENOUGH THAT YOU RETURN TO THE FRONT PAGE OF AICN! TRUST ME, NO MATTER HOW MUCH YOU MAY WISH TO CONTINUE READING... STOP. YOU WILL NEVER FORGIVE YOURSELF.)

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THIS IS YOUR LAST CHANCE!

Alright, I gave you enough warning....

In the films like BLOODSPORT and STREETFIGHTER the violence tends to go unchecked. In World Wrestling Federation you never get the sense of pain, the breaking of bones.... or the true horror that comes with ramming a man’s face into a metal pole.

Peckinpah came under fire for letting the blood fly in THE WILD BUNCH. However, he felt it was irresponsible to make death easy. To make a bullet wound be a clean, blood free hole in the fabric of your shirt. Death is neat.... No it isn’t. It is also not beautiful.

This all comes to full steam when we see Ed Norton fight Blonde Guy. “I felt like destroying something beautiful,” he says while walking from the gasping destroyed man. Norton doesn’t look cool, he is not an image to emulate. And we see the results of his unchecked rage when we turn back to see the horror show before us. The bleeding gums, the broken cheek bones and the missing teeth. The swelling and the pumping of blood from the face. It’s horrific. It’s terrible. It’s repulsive. It’s real. And I’m not saying this in that, “Whoa man, check this shit out,” sort of way.

The last real fist fight I had was back right before Junior High and it was with a friend. We had had a rough day. I felt he had wronged me. Goofing around I put him in a headlock. He got pissed, started hitting me. One thing led to another and I broke his jaw and nose. I escaped with a couple of bruises and a cut on my knuckle. But for about 3 weeks I had to look at my friend and apologize everyday. Everytime Blonde Guy appears after this scene... for me... I never want to hit someone again with the intent to destroy.

When I was thinking of being a makeup artist in High School, I went to the town mortician to see if I could score some mortician’s wax. I had read in ‘THE MAN OF A THOUSAND FACES’ that it was Chaney’s favorite makeup stuff this side of a grease pencil. The mortician took me in and over about a 3 to 4 week period showed me all manners of damaged in death human beings. It is not a pretty thing. One makeup artist I met told me he collects autopsy photos so he can strive for realism.

It’s sick. It’s morbid. But... sometimes it’s necessary to get the details. This is one way that it should be done. Isn’t the only way. I can yell and scream about how horror and action were everybit as horrific and thrilling prior to the advent of color. But ya know. Red is needed for both blood and roses.

Check out Kirk Douglas’ face by the end of CHAMPION or Deniro’s through RAGING BULL. Personally, in my mind’s eye I remember those faces in color for some reason. And it was horrific. Why do I remember it in color? Because the imagination is even stronger than that which is shown.

Alot of the damage in this film is done with sound and editing. I’m not sure how long we linger upon Blondie’s destroyed face, but I believe it’s about a second. Had we seen the reverse throughout that beating. Blondie’s face as the fists came whirring down upon him. Shattering and destroying his good looks for all time. Fincher wisely lingers instead on the rage upon Norton’s face. The same face we saw weep the sorrow of his own inner demons into Bob’s bitch tits.

Another possible reason for the hatred some exhibit for this film lies within the subliminal editing throughout the film. Single frames to three altered frames at a time. A flash that is supposed the be beyond the vision to recognize by the human eye. Some people in the theater didn’t see a single flashing Brad Pitt. Not once. But he is there. Also there are strips or banners that say things that flash.... as well as genitalia. This is so fast that unless your vision has been tuned by years of MTV.... you may not even see it. I have counted at least 8 instances where I saw something flash in the blink of an eye. This may affect people weirdly. I saw some people react with confusion at these moments in the film.

The Dust Brothers’ score is sometimes in that spine-tingly register of discordant tones that I feel are meant to make you and render you disturbed. This is not an ‘easy’ bit of mindless entertainment.

Personally I look at the film and see a man that went to a medical professional to get help and was instead ridiculed. Slowly he is driven a bit insane, then really insane. (By the way, this really happened to Charles Whitman... turned out he had a tumor that had gone undiagnosed) He’s charismatic, he creates a following of people around the basic concept of not being a drone your entire life.... come with him. But... of course, this leads these schmucks into an entirely new level of being a drone... a space monkey.... They’ve traded following one domesticated animal for a rabid animal. Yet still they are followers and not attractive followers. They are not shown as receiving any 'greater glory', they are shown as being pathetic mindless zombies.

Watch the scene with Bob’s dead corpse. First off... the scene becomes very dark because it is important that we only hear and see the reactions of the people in the scene. They stand there and look at one of their fellow space monkeys with his head blown to bits. Norton... the only semi-thinking man in the room is horrified by this. Screaming out his true name. That this was a beautiful human being and that’s gone now. Instead this regiment of space-monkeys can only retreat to discipline.

Hell... this could very well be an indictment of every sort of Green Beret, Special Forces, Marine training.... Anytime you are taught that if you see a man go down, he went down for the cause and will go onto a glorious afterlife.... rah rah rah...

My god, there is even a bit of moral redemption in Ed Norton’s character. Sure it’s dark, but it’s there. The sane side of him is Larry Talbot.... “Please... Lock me up... I turn into a wolf.” He realizes the horror of what he has done and tries to stop it. BUT.... as horror and reality goes, sometimes you can’t stop momentum. This isn't left up to interpretation... it is right there... clear as blue sky upon the screen.

This isn’t a film that has nothing to say. Hell, this isn’t about creating another Timothy McVeigh... this is a film about spotting them... recognizing them.... and acting against it early on... before it gets out of hand.

But come on folks.... Ya have to kind of read between the lines. You can’t just be a passive member of the audience. Use that which lies between your ears, and you’ll hear and see the message here.

It’s not about going out and starting FIGHT CLUB chapters. That is clearly shown to be the actions of an insane man in this film. CLEARLY. You have to trust that others will see that. Sure we have idiots in society that might latch on to Tyler Durden as some sort of prophet.

And we have had a man who tried to kill in the name of Travis Bickle.

We have had a case or two that has been allegedly tied to Mickey and Mallory.

But do we measure the millions that have not pulled the monkey see monkey do bit with film, literature and music? What about all the people in the world that get turned off by the violence in this film. The ones that feel they never want to see a film begin to get near that again. Will those people go out and begin beating people? That night, will they go home and beat their wife or children? Or will they be a bit disgusted?

But how many men have killed for the name and glory of Jesus Christ? Mohammed? The United States Of America?

From this film, violence is shown as being an insane act of destruction... not beauty. It shows how popular messages can be used to direct that which we fear the most. If you leave this movie afraid that this could happen here.... GOOD.... YOU SHOULD BE AFRAID. That is the whole point. To scare you. To make you not want to be a space monkey.... another mindless thoughtless follower.... another brick in the wall.... a goosestepper.... a fool.

I saw this in a theater filled with the target audience twice now. Both times the audience reacted in horror at key scenes, squirmed in key scenes and laughed at key scenes. They reacted throughout the film. Afterwards in front of the theater they stood in circles of 8 and 9 talking about the film. I listened in. No plans were being hatched. No, ‘God wouldn’t be cool to start our own Fight Club’ statements. Instead they talked about how much that looked like it hurt. How gross it was to make soap from humans. How if anyone turned the car slicers backwards at a parking lot that they should be shot.

The only prank that I heard being approved of was taking an industrial strength electro-magnet into a Blockbuster Video and destroying their tapes... and the splicing of genitalia into family films.... but none of them know where to get 35 mm porn scenes.

Mostly though they were discussing the movie, how they hated Meatloaf dying, and how gross Blondie looked. How they wanted the Dust Brothers soundtrack and that they wanted to see it again because... well because of the twist at the end. They think it’ll be a different experience the second time.

So... Have faith in your common man and woman. Your neighbor is probably not a serial killer. Your plane will most likely not crash. Your airbag will deploy. As for the destruction of the debt record... hell, that idea was born in the sixties and seventies from groups like SDS and the Black Panthers. That was well beyond my generation.

Don’t be so scared that it blinds you from great cinema. Once you begin worrying about what the common person will do with FIGHT CLUB... well ya might as well start pulling books off shelves, reinstate the Hayes Code and never leave your house. This is just an ideal case of a protagonist actually being a fully developed three dimensional villain without his own knowledge.

This is not pornography. This should not be banned. This is art.