Where "Office Space" hatched a plan to rob from the country stolen from Superman III and "American Beauty" had blackmail, Lolita like lust and drug use, neither pushed the envelope like David Fincher's "Fight Club."
"Fight Club" is a masterpiece on all accounts even on things having nothing to do with the film. This film caught all the right breaks at the right time from timing to studio backing. The money was there from Fox because you had Brad Pitt. Fincher wasn't executive produced to make mainstream film.
It is a film that isn't handicapped because it has to have a love interest. Marla Singer's part plays a pivotal role in the film. The timing of this film was brilliant, just two years before 9/11. With acts of vandalism and terrorism, there's no way this would've been released after that.
"Fight Club" author Chuck Palahniuk worked with the screenwriter Jim Uhls on the script. The source material wasn't just ravaged by hack screenwriters. The film cost 63 million and only took in 37 million. It made its money overseas and on video.
You have this incredible director, two of the best actors of their generation, a script and a studio willing to release it. As great as this film is, it still hasn't been seen by the masses like you would think. More people have probably seen "Office Space."
Then there are people who have seen it only for the fighting. Meatheads of the world, the film isn't really about fighting, it's about the male experience. It's about society. Our culture. It's about spitting in the face of all the expectations and norms we have.
In the film, Jack blackmails his boss like "American Beauty" and uses the money to start up Fight Clubs all across the country. Fight Club becomes Project Mayhem, a group who pulls pranks all over cities with their big goal being to blow up the credit card companies. The debt goes back to zero. Everyone starts over. The film is about ridding your life of all the stuff that doesn't matter. It's about human sacrifices that give rebirth. It's about selling women's cottage cheese back to them.
We had "The Sixth Sense" earlier but "Fight Club" caught us off guard because Tyler isn't a ghost. Turns out he's a figment of Jack's imagination. We've seen this device countless times over the last ten years to where it's standard, but in 1999 it was a jolt. Fincher has done some good films notably "Zodiac" but none of them have been a masterpiece. Brad Pitt has done a lot but will he ever get to play a counter culture character of this magnitude? Will Ed Norton get to have a character and story of this level that has a studio backing?
When asked about the miracle of how this got made, Slashfilm Managing Editor Dave Chen summed it up best.
“You have to accept that Fight Club was kind of a happy accident. You have an auteur director taking on a big budget film that’s virtually unmarketable.”
If a studio accountant looks at that equation, that is why we may never see a film of that caliber ever again.
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