So Pretentious . So Overblown . So Overrated

Rating: 5/10 (12 February 2003)

!!!! POSSIBLE SPOILERS !!!!!
The premise of a lonely aimless soul attending cancer therapy groups and AA meetings might have been savagely funny if done right but here it`s badly executed as the first 20 minutes is taken up with Ed Norton droning on in an over literary voice over . I know a cinematic masterwork like APOCALYPSE NOW used voice over but so did THE DUKES OF HAZZARD so it`s just as likely to be the work of a buffoon than a genius . The themes of male grief , alienation and the back lash against 80s consumerism are just as badly developed

FIGHT CLUB is good in parts like the scene where the members cover a car park with bird seed so that the pigeons s*hit all over the new cars , but the film is unworthy of the praise lavished upon it by large sections of IMDB voters . I can imagine 17 year old males loving this film - I`d be shocked if they didn`t - but for anyone else who`s old enough to have more mature and critical views should be able to recognise this as one extremely overlong overrated one trick pony . As for the metaphysical twist ending it just doesn`t make sense and brings the whole proceedings down . The narrator was beating himself up was he ? Yeah right .
If FIGHT CLUB is the masterpiece it`s supposed to be then how come it was virtually ignored at the Oscars in one of the weakest years for films in a long time ?