Guests:
Andrew Corns
Host of the Revisionist Almanac
@revalmanac on IG, X, YouTube, TikTok, and Letterboxd
Previously on Gaslight (1946) and Do the Right Thing (1989) Revisit
Peterson W. Hill - Co-Host of the War Starts at Midnight podcast
@petersonwhill on IG, Letterboxd, and Twitter
Previous Guest on Gone Girl (2014) and Parasite (2019)
Cast:
David Fincher, Director
Jim Uhls, Writer
The Dust Brothers, Music
Edward Norton as the Narrator
Brad Pitt as Tyler Durden
Helena Bonham Carter as Marla Singer
Meat Loaf as Robert "Bob" Paulson
Jared Leto as Angel Face
Holt McCallany as the Mechanic
Zach Grenier as Richard Chesler
*Recognition:
Fight Club was released on November 15, 1999.
On a budget of just over $60 million, Fight Club would gross roughly $101 million to finish 35th at the Worldwide box office that year.
David Fincher oversaw the DVD construction and special packaging for the one and two-disc sets. The film sold more than 6 million copies on DVD and video within the first ten years, making it one of the largest-selling home media items in the studio's history, in addition to grossing over $55 million in video and DVD rentals.
During its release, Fight Club became a lightning rod of criticism both positive and negative with many citing A Clockwork Orange as a comparison.
Fight Club was nominated for one Oscar at the 2000 Academy Award for Best Sound Editing.
In 2003, Fight Club was listed as one of the "50 Best Guy Movies of All Time" by Men's Journal.
In 2004 and 2006, Fight Club was voted by Empire readers as the eighth and tenth greatest film of all time, respectively.
Total Film ranked Fight Club as "The Greatest Film of our Lifetime" in 2007 during the magazine's tenth anniversary.
In 2007, Premiere selected Tyler Durden's line, "The first rule of fight club is you do not talk about fight club," as the 27th greatest movie line of all time.
In 2008, readers of Empire ranked Tyler Durden eighth on a list of the 100 Greatest Movie Characters.
Empire also identified Fight Club as the 10th greatest movie of all time in its 2008 issue The 500 Greatest Movies of All Time.
Fight Club currently holds an 81% among critics on RT, a 67 score on Metacritic, and a 4.3/5 on Letterboxd.
Plot Summary: Fight Club, directed by David Fincher, is a dark, visceral exploration of disillusionment and rebellion in a consumer-driven society. Edward Norton stars as an unnamed narrator, a corporate drone who feels trapped in the relentless cycle of modern capitalism. His insomnia and sense of detachment lead him to underground support groups, where he finds fleeting solace. Still, it’s only when he meets the charismatic anarchist Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt) that he feels truly alive.
Tyler and the narrator start a "Fight Club," an underground fight society where men brawl to escape the numbness of their lives. What begins as cathartic release soon spirals into chaos as Tyler’s influence over the narrator grows, drawing him into an increasingly violent, nihilistic philosophy.
Did You Know:
Author Chuck Palahniuk first came up with the idea for the novel after being beaten up on a camping trip when he complained to some nearby campers about the noise of their radio. When he returned to work, he was fascinated to find that nobody would mention or acknowledge his injuries, instead saying such commonplace things as "How was your weekend?" Palahniuk concluded that the reason people reacted this way was because if they asked him what had happened, a degree of personal interaction would be necessary, and his workmates simply didn't care enough to connect with him on a personal level. It was his fascination with this societal 'blocking' which became the foundation for the novel.
The original "pillow talk"-scene had Marla saying "I want to have your abortion". When this was objected to by Fox 2000 Pictures President of Production Laura Ziskin, David Fincher said he would change it on the proviso that the new line couldn't be cut. Ziskin agreed and Fincher wrote the replacement line, "I haven't been fucked like that since grade school". When Ziskin saw the new line, she was even more outraged and asked for the original line to be put back, but, as per their deal, Fincher refused.
The visible breath in the cave scene is recycled Leonardo DiCaprio breath from Titanic (1997), which was composited into the shot.
Tyler Durden was originally going to recite a workable recipe for home-made explosives (as he does in the novel). But in the interest of public safety, the filmmakers decided to substitute real recipes for the fictional ones.
To ensure that Bob's breasts and love handles hung correctly, his fat suit was filled with birdseed, so that it would 'spill' over his pants and give the impression of sagging flesh. Altogether, the suit plus the seed weighed over one hundred pounds.
Ask Dana Anything:
Andrew Corns - Host of Revisionist Almanac
Were you a Meat Loaf head?
If you could fight a celebrity living or dead, who would it be?
Bar soap or body wash?
Lufa or raw dog?
Peterson W. Hill - Co-Host of the War Starts at Midnight podcast
Wouldn't there have been computer backups for the credit card companies?
Best Performance: Edward Norton (Narrator)/Brad Pitt (Tyler)
Best Secondary Performance: Edward Norton (Narrator)/Helena Bonham Carter (Marla)/Brad Pitt (Tyler)
Most Charismatic Award: Meat Loaf (Bob)/Brad Pitt (Tyler)/David Fincher (Director)
Best Scene:
Bob
Meeting Tyler
Sticking Up the Cashier
First Night of Fight Club
Fat and Lye
Mobster Beats Tyler
Who and Where is Tyler Durden?
Narrator Tries to Stop Tyler
Favorite Scene: Bob/Sticking Up the Cashier/Meeting Tyler
Most Indelible Moment: Tyler Durden/Brad Pitt's Abs/Ending/Who and Where is Tyler Durden?
In Memorium:
Teri Garr, 79, American actress (Tootsie, Young Frankenstein, Close Encounters of the Third Kind)
Alan Rachins, 82, American actor (L.A. Law, Dharma & Greg, Showgirls)
Quincy Jones, 91, American Hall of Fame record producer ("We Are the World", Thriller), composer ("Soul Bossa Nova"), and arranger, 28-time Grammy winner. Producer (The Color Purple, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air (TV))
Best Lines/Funniest Lines:
Tyler Durden: The things you own end up owning you.
Tyler Durden: It's only after we've lost everything that we're free to do anything.
Tyler Durden: You're not your job. You're not how much money you have in the bank. You're not the car you drive. You're not the contents of your wallet. You're not your fucking khakis. You're the all-singing, all-dancing crap of the world.
Narrator: This is your life and it's ending one minute at a time.
Narrator: I found freedom. Losing all hope was freedom.
Tyler Durden: Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken.
Tyler Durden: Now, a question of etiquette - as I pass, do I give you the ass or the crotch?
Narrator: You met me at a very strange time in my life.
Marla Singer: A condom is the glass slipper of our generation. You slip one on when you meet a stranger, you dance all night, you throw it away. The condom, not the stranger.
Narrator: On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.
Narrator: [reading] I am Jack's colon.
Tyler Durden: I get cancer, I kill Jack.
Tyler Durden: We're a generation of men raised by women. I'm wondering if another woman is really the answer we need.
Tyler Durden: Even the Mona Lisa's falling apart.
Marla Singer: My God. I haven't been fucked like that since grade school.
Tyler Durden: Hey, you created me. I didn't create some loser alter-ego to make myself feel better. Take some responsibility!
Tyler Durden: People do it every day. They talk to themselves. They see themselves as they'd like to be. They don't have the courage you have to just run with it.
Marla Singer: My God. I haven't been fucked like that since grade school.
Narrator: I had it all. I had a stereo that was very decent. A wardrobe that was getting very respectable. I was close to being complete.
Narrator: You're fucking Marla, Tyler?
Tyler Durden: Technically, you're fucking Marla, but it's all the same to her.
Tyler Durden: Self improvement is masturbation.
Tyler Durden: When deep space exploration ramps up, it'll be the corporations that name everything. The IBM Stellar Sphere, The Microsoft Galaxy, Planet Starbucks.
Tyler Durden: Gentlemen, welcome to Fight Club. The first rule of Fight Club is: you do not talk about Fight Club. The second rule of Fight Club is: you DO NOT talk about Fight Club! Third rule of Fight Club: someone yells "stop!", goes limp, taps out, the fight is over. Fourth rule: only two guys to a fight. Fifth rule: one fight at a time, fellas. Sixth rule: No shirts, no shoes. Seventh rule: fights will go on as long as they have to. And the eighth and final rule: if this is your first time at Fight Club, you have to fight.
Fight Club Members: His name was Robert Paulsen!
Tyler Durden: We're consumers. We're byproducts of a lifestyle obsession. These things don't concern me. What concerns me are celebrity magazines, television with 500 channels, some guy's name on my underwear, Rogaine, Viagra, Alestra.
Narrator: Martha Stewart.
Tyler Durden: Fuck Martha Stewart. Martha's polishing the brass on the Titanic. It's all going down, man. So, fuck off with your sofa units and Strine Green stripe patterns.
The Stanley Rubric:
Legacy: 7.38
Impact/Significance: 6.13
Novelty: 8.38
Classic-ness: 7.88
Rewatchability: 5.63
Audience Score: 9.4 (92% Google, 96% RT)
Total: 44.8
Remaining Questions:
Why is the ending hopeful?
Does the Narrator survive?
What does the next day in America look like?