Very Interesting but problematic (beware SPOILER)

Rating: Null/10 (10 September 2001)

As all the other movies of David Fincher, this one is really well directed and filmed. It may be formally less neat than the others. It's not as clean as visibly beautiful as, say, Seven, or Alien3. But the point is not there, it is ideologically more complex and dangerous than the usual. I couldn't read all the reviews (there's too many) but I didn't see anybody noticing the paradox there. On one hand, you have one character, Durden, helping the narrator to understand that he lives in a world of lies, irreality, superficiality, an alienating world. So far so good, not very original and not very hard, criticizing the ridiculous consumer society we're all living in (in the western world); although it's very well done, with a lot of black humour and intelligent wit (I especially liked the way Norton finds the way to stop to go to work or the soap manufacturing). As somebody already said here, 20 something rebelling people (that includes me) will find what they came for. But, slowly, you start to understand that the remedy is worst than the disease and that it brings us back to the Europe of the 1920's and 1930's: to fascism and its derived products. Durden is creating a fascist, blood-thirsty militia and he is the Duce. And what's appeared as innocent jokes a few minutes before gets a nauseating smell. The same one about the people desperate for their look, getting their fat sucked, that I found hilarious suddenly reminds me that the Nazis were doing something similar with their victims body. The mandatory head shaving for club members, etc. Why it is problematic? Although Durden is a complete nutcase, his philosophy is presented in a very appealing way at least at the beginning of the movie. So the movie just gives us two options as repulsing as the other. I also don't know what to think about the fact that the narrator has to invent another personality to perform these horrible deeds as if we have to excuse him because "he wasn't himself at the time". Is he responsible? He is. He has that violence element in him. It's not somebody else. As a lot of us has the fascist element inside ourselves as well (as human beings I mean) and we have to fight it, not to apologize about some "temporary insanity" crap. Well that's a little bit of a heavy review I wrote but I'd advise people to see it as it gets rare, movies that make us think so much. Moreover, I think it's an excellent movie in almost every classic cinematographic aspect. It's in my opinion very violent in a somewhat sickening way but it is no useless violence as in most Tarentino-inspired too many movies we get these days. It has a very distinct purpose. But this is certainly not a Nice-movie-Let's-grab-a-burger one.