Fight Club

December 11, 2004

Rated: R Runtime: 139 min Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

The first rule of Fight Club, is you do not talk about Fight Club. And that applies to this review as well. This is one of those movies that you really do not want to know much about going into. You’ll enjoy it much more if you go in cold and just let it unfold in front of your eyes. Plus, Movies for Guys policy is that we do not ruin movies by doing spoilers, so we’re not going to tell you much about the plot beyond what you’ve seen in the trailers.

This is a very complex story with some very complex characters to go along with it. The basic premise is Jack, played by Edward Norton, is a yuppie bachelor who’s caught in the typical cubicle existence where one day blends into the next without really feeling or enjoying much of life. He’s sick, tired and bored of life and will do some weird stuff to try to amuse himself. Enter Brad Pitt as Tyler Durden. Together these two discover that feeling pain is better than feeling nothing at all, and they start what is basically a bare fists boxing club where other similar guys show up and beat the dog snot out of each other every night.

Now I realize this plot sounds kinda cheesy, and this is also why the trailers never really excited us too much, and we didn’t have high hopes for this movie. But trust me, there’s alot more to it than that which we cant tell you without spoiling the movie. The character development and storyline twists in this thing are absolutely wonderful.

Both Norton and Pitt do excellent jobs with their characters in this movie. And Norton really surprised me with how well he handled some of the fight sequences. For those of you with lady friends that swoon at Brad’s pecks and washboard stomach, they wont be disappointed here, you see alot of his flesh. And for us guys, you get to see him get the smackdown laid upon his rooty poo monkey butt. A true win win situation! If you have problems seeing blood, be sure to take those warnings about graphic depictions of violence seriously on this movie. They aren’t kidding around.

In short, this is a great intense movie that also has some really great subtle bits of humor. And it’s also an excellent character piece carried by strong performances by the stars. It has alot of the same traits as something like “Pulp Fiction” albeit this one is a bit more subtle than anything Tarantino has ever done. It’s also one of those movies that after you see it once, you’ll wanna watch it again knowing how it all turns out so you can watch some of the more intricate details as well as studying Meat Loaf’s knockers. This movie isn’t for everyone, it’s definitely a look at the dark side of humanity and not everyone will be able to handle the graphic nature of seeing someone get their faced pounded into bloody hamburger meat. If that doesn’t bother you though, definitely go see it.

Posted by Billy Bob | Filed Under 4 Stars, Action, Brad Pitt, DVD, Edward Norton, Helena Bonham Carter, Meat Loaf, R