| Product: |
Fight Club (DVD) |
| Date: |
11/09/01 (324 review reads) |
| Rating: |
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Advantages: Read the opinion!
Disadvantages: None
David Fincher has a thing for films that scar. First came Se7en, and then Fight Club. Both films menacingly dark and chilling, yet tantalisingly thought provoking and intelligently written. And both with killer endings (Don’t worry, I’m not going to ruin them for anyone who hasn’t seen them). So where do I start??
The ever-impressive Ed Norton stars as The Narrator, a chronic insomniac and narcoleptic whose life is so meaninglessly empty and unfulfilled, that it basically revolves around condiment consumption and Ikea mail ordering.
He soon finds himself becoming addicted to attending self-help seminars for various diseases such as TB and lung cancer, where sufferers share each others burden and he finds that by pretending he is dying helps to cure his insomnia. That is, until Marla Singer (Helena Bonham Carter) turns up… Then one night, after returning home from yet another business trip he finds his precious high storey condo blown up, with all his material possessions spewed out onto the street below. Cue Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt), a live for the moment soap-maker who teaches him that there is more to life than the consumer culture that has devoured today’s society, and to cure their combined angst and feeling of abandonment, they begin beating each other up. What’s more, they find that they are not the only ones who feel alienated in today’s world, and quickly Fight Club is set up, where guys take turns massaging faces with their fists. With the inclusion the suicidal Marla who comes between the two, things quickly begin to escalate and get out of control as Fight Club spreads chaos across the city.
The film is darkly comic, with splatterings of humour that will have you laughing out loud, and is mixed with some quite gruesome violence at times. Hats of to Fincher who, despite cold spells with the average Alien3 and The Game, has managed to effortlessly pull off another landmark movie filled
with millennial angst and the disillusion of a generation. The film is dark and gloomy without actually being morbid and depressing.
Brad Pitt shows that he can actually act, and Helena Bonham Carter gives her career best performance as the brazen Marla. Watch it once and the twist near the end comes as a genuinely shocking but believable twist, but watch it again and the hints smack you in face so explicitly that you’ll feel stupid for missing them.
The film is littered with expert little touches that add to the brilliance of the film: the subliminal Brad Pitt flashes; the walk-in Ikea showroom shot; the special effects shots where the camera zips all over the place.
So then, for the ladies there’s Brad Pitt half naked, and for the guys there’s Jared Leto getting ten shades of s*** kicked out of him (apparently the make up was so realistic nobody would go near him during lunch break). And any film that dares to have Meat Loaf star with a pair of enormous ‘bitch tits’ has got to be something special. Oh, and the amazing ‘Where is my mind?’ by The Pixies at the end – pure bliss!
The DVD was recently voted the best DVD available and it’s easy to see why. There are two DVDs crammed full of extras, deleted scenes, interviews, documentaries, trailers, and the icing on the cake: the amazing director’s and actors’ commentary! All of which is set out on colourful interactive menus and wrapped up in mock-paperbag packaging.
I also recommend reading the original novel by Chuck Pahalniuk – although personally I believe its a rare case of the film being better than the book, its still worth a read. And also the soundtrack by The Dust Brothers ain’t too bad either. The fact that Fight Club was over-looked at the Oscars is a disgrace to whoever at The Academy actually decides on the nominations. But it also goes to show how derogatory and irrelevant the
Oscars are becoming. (Sorry, I had to get that in – I could go on for hours if you’d let me….)
All in all: An absolute must. Defy me if you dare. Come on, I’ll fight ya…
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tanny - 27/09/01 Loved this op because you obviously, rate the film very highly, just as I do. Enjoying reading your ops very much and yeah the song at the end is awesome! :) |
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