Brilliant, except for the end

Rating: 8/10 (10 February 2006)

Fight Club is an angry, hilarious, sadistic, satirical, mean spirited and extremely ambitious film. In a sentence or 2, Norton's character struggles with self-worth, meaning and general self-loathing in a culture that has castrated what it is to be a "man". That is, until a chance meeting with Pitt's character changes his life, signaling the creation of the violent, male "becoming" exercise of Fight Club (a brutal, secret, hand-to-hand combat ritual). This leads to a larger movement of cultural anarchy and revolution. Its a wonder the film got made because it is dark, misogynist, violent and left-leaning (all good in my book). FC is one of those films that can be life changing and get under your skin (particularly for men), with its messages of male self-awareness and identity, rage at the state of the world and vitriolic bashing of the consumerism, materialism, conformity and vanity that some of us see and detest. It is also one of those movies that is ripe for misunderstanding, as some people do not "get it" (the fighting, for example, is more a metaphoric exercise, not a call for frat guys to go punch each other silly). Pitt is a revelation, Norton is just as magnetic, and Helena Bonham Carter steals several scenes playing against type. I think the first 3/4 of the movie is brilliant. It falls apart at the end for me on one thing (spoiler warning) - Pitt HAS TO BE A REAL PERSON, not a figment of Norton's imagination - even though they are clearly alter-egos in the metaphoric sense. Though the struggle is clearly Norton's own internal one, it has to be externalized, which it was for the 1st 3/4 (this has been handled much better in much lesser movies- "Bad Influence" with James Spader comes to mind). When I learned the Pitt character is "not real", it ruined it for me. Kind of like the "it was all a dream" ending you see in really bad movies. The attempt to go back at the end & stick Norton in all the scenes that Pitt was in is clunky & doesn't work. Just an opinion - still a fantastic film and an icon-making performance by Pitt.