Reactions to the movie Fight Club, after watching it again at age 32

August 18th, 2008 in Cultural Items I've Consumed by admin 42

When I was in my mid-twenties I loved David Fincher’s Fight Club. Like a lot of twenty-somethings, I thought it spoke to me and for me, to a certain extent. I dug the whole “corporations and posessions are bad” vibe. I dug the fighting and the male bonding stuff. I really resonated with the whole “sticking it to the man” ethos, because at that time I was working for The Man as it were.

In the interest of full disclosure, I now ownafewpieces of Ikea furniture/housewares in my home, which (the home)is significantly nicer than the one Tyler Durden lives in for most of the film. In fact, I just bought two cheap footstools from Ikea last week and they’re lovely. That’s not to say I’ve gone all “Edward Norton character pre-meeting the Brad Pitt character,” but still. Full disclosure.

In another bit of disclosure, I spent a decent part of my twenties living, to a certain extent, like some of the characters in Fight Club. I went through a boxing phase, and a pretty long playing-semipro-football phase, which I might still be in. In short, I got my a** whupped a lot, but also whupped the occasionall a**. It was fun. The male bonding was real. That part of the film still resonates. I also lived in pretty crappy houses, because they were all I could afford (see: working for the man while also being addicted to semipro football). Knowing full well that my crappy houses were still pretty nice (the house on Climax, not necessarily the one on Clemens), it’s still no fun to live in crappy, leaky, disgusting old houses.

Anyway. Here are some reactions to seeing the film again as a 32 year-old, which I realized pretty early on I probably shouldn’t have done (seeing it again). I felt the way I felt when I recently went to an amusement park one too many times…it ceased being fun. I realized I was over it, or maybe had outgrown it. Anyway, the reactions:

  1. Fincher is an amazing director. Yeah, much of what he did in the film that looked unique and cool has been ripped off to such an extent that it no longer looks unique and cool, but it was still a really good-looking, creativemovie.
  2. Thescript was heavy-handed and preachy, almost to thepoint of being ridiculous. This reaction pretty much speaks for itself but I’m ashamed at how much I didn’t notice this in my mid-twenties, when I was so busy thinking this movie was awesome.
  3. The movie was a little too “hardcore” and self-destructive for my ever-softening 32-year old constitution. That is, I have less of a stomach for violence and overall disturbingness. This film is full of both.
  4. My houses really weren’t that bad (see: above comments re houses).
  5. This really is a movie for young, idealistic people, not not-so-young people who have lived a little and lost some idealism. The idea of stealing human fat to make soap that I can then sell to big chain stores just doesn’t have the appeal that it once did. And I’m not really sad to see this kind of idealism go (puts feet on Ikea footstool).
  6. I can’t get done watching this movie and thank God for it because of the violence, sensuality, and hopelessness that it contains.
  7. Fight Club is the kind of movie you say you like just to convey a certain image or vibe about yourself, and I’ve found that I’m now too old to even continue attempting to convey that vibe. I am a little sad to see this go.

If you still love this movie it’s okay (not that you need my permission to like or not like a given movie). It’s still a great film, and will no doubt be a reference piece for years to come. Just wondered if anyone has had a similar reaction to this film.