Friday, April 27, 2012

Breaking The First Rule - Let's Talk About Fight Club

In everyone's life there are a couple of life changing experiences brought on through media. I've had a couple of my own, through music - my first hearing of Tubular Bells, television - as I lay in a hospital bed and experienced Band of Brothers, literature - Chronicles of Narnia, and film.

Film is where this post comes in. There are movies which have gripped us, thrilled us and ripped us to emotional shreds over the years. Personally it's been movies such as Ned Kelly, Instinct and The Matrix.
None have affected me quite so much as Fight Club though. It's cynical, it's gritty, it's smart and it's bloody entertaining.

Our unnamed 'hero' (psychotically played by Edward Norton) has reached the bottom of the pile, an insomniac, he starts attending support groups to release his emotions and find some peace. All this is interrupted by the intrusion on Marla Singer; a live-fast-die-young harlot played by who else other than Helena Bonham Carter. Our hero's life is completely thrown into chaos by the explosion of his apartment, upon which he decides to move in with a sociopath soap merchant he met by chance on a plane journey. This man is Tyler Durden. This man is anarchy incarnate. This man is portrayed by Brad Pitt in a role which should have gotten him an Oscar. Tyler teaches a new way of life to our man and soon all hell breaks lose after they form an underground club in which they beat the living hell out of each other and plenty of willing participants in testosterone fueled battles of primal fury. But this is not a movie about a fight club, it is so much more.



This is a movie about abandoning the system, starting your own, and screwing the rules to do what you see fit to form your Utopia. It is incredibly smart too, you simply will not see the twist coming until it's too late, by then it's a whole new movie. It will provoke a deep passion in you, it will stir you, it will thrill you, it will challenge you, it will educate you, it will entertain you. Fight Club has it all. And trust me, without it, you can't really be sure whether you have anything yourself.

You're not your job. You're not how much money you have in the bank. You're not the car you drive. You're not the contents of your wallet. You're not your fucking khakis. You're the all-singing, all-dancing crap of the world.

 It's only after we've lost everything that we're free to do anything.

Over and out.

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